FIRST CNN VIDEO FOOTAGE FROM LONDON BOMBINGS FROM A CAMERA PHONE

Pretty decent article by the Chicago Tribune's Mike Hughlett on how technology is changing the manner and method of how big media covers stories:

CNN viewers were greeted Thursday with video footage of bent metal and broken glass from a bombed-out London train. The images' source: a video camera phone, a first for the news network.

Meanwhile, amateur pictures of the bombing began popping up on Flickr, a photo swapping Web site, at the same time mainstream news organizations were announcing the tragedy.

Welcome to the world of citizen newsgathering, where technology and the age-old desire to communicate hot information, be it hard news or soft gossip, are converging and forcing traditional news outlets to dramatically change the way they cover big news events.

It got a big push from the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and has gathered more steam as camera phones have become more ubiquitous, blogs have become more numerous, and mainstream media outlets have gotten more Web-savvy. (full article)