Digital war reporting

Three very interesting links come our way this week. First up, Kings of War leads us to the New Media and the Warfighter report from a Center for Strategic leadership workshop. The report concludes,

New media as a means to achieve strategic information effects is an integral part of today’s military operating environment. link

Meanwhile, The Virtual Dimension of Contemporary Insurgency and Counterinsurgency from Dr David J. Betz at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London is an extensive look at how digital media is changing the way war is reported,

Western reporters must rely on local reporters and translators to be their eyes and ears on the ground. But much of the imagery of the actual battlefield is shot by soldiers themselves and distributed via the Internet, as one can easily see from the thousands of clips on sites such as YouTube and LiveLeak. link

Lastly, Mediating Conflict reviews a War reporting Workshop held in London recently. Here’s part one and when you’re done with that, here’s part two,

If you turn to the blogs then I think you can build up a better picture of what is going on inside Afghanistan and Iraq. But that’s not to say there aren’t significant and troubling blindspots in what we know about the conflicts. link

War reporting is far from over, but it is now essential for journalists to have their eyes and ears open to blogs and social media to supplement the core job of reporting.