ABSTRACT
Network newswork entails newsgathering practices that privilege the truth claims of Tier One institutional sources and Tier Two networked opinion leaders. It also legitimizes Tier Three networked communities whose massive numbers of social media posts serve as mutually corroborating truth claims meriting media attention. The merits of network newswork, however, could inadvertently eclipse time consuming and expensive conventional legwork field reporting, possibly further sidelining the muted injustices suffered by digitally-unconnected communities switched off from the network society. Network newswork practices must therefore complement and not compete with offline journalistic practices that are essential for bearing witness and telling the stories of the voiceless digital poor.
