There's a good answer on the question of Twitter, blogs etc. as news. From Susan Chira, foreign editor for the NY Times, answering reader questions March 30-April 3, 2009. Via @jayrosen_nyu (btw ... the link at the end of this quote goes to the page it's taken from but you need to scroll down to get to the questions. This answer is from the first question.)
So let's take citizen journalists, bloggers, or even in some cases, Twitterers. I think for professional journalists the information they provide is great raw material. But before we can print it as fact, we usually have to sort through it and try to figure out how to verify it. Let's just take a few of the very charged conflicts we cover: say, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the war between Russia and Georgia. How do we know someone sending us information over the transom is accurately reporting what he or she witnessed, or whether the information is being slanted or even fabricated to suit an ideological point of view? As reporters, we can weigh statements from witnesses we interview personally, and cross-check them with other sources. We are still learning how to do that in a warp-speed Web world. But it's great to have the opportunity to figure out how to get more information, and the new tools to enable us to broaden and deepen our coverage using the resources of the public.
from: Talk to the Newsroom: Foreign Editor (NY Times)
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