ABSTRACT
Studying online journalism reveals a number of inconsistencies in the traditional
concepts and frames of reference of journalism studies. The categories traditionally
used and analyzed by journalism scholars have shown their limitations. Professional
journalists are no longer-if they ever were-the central and sole actors producing the
news. They now share the stage with institutions, citizens, companies, experts, or
“infomediaries” (Rebillard 2010; Spano 2011) who can-to a certain extent-directly
communicate with the public (Matheson 2004; Lowrey 2006; Reese et al. 2007;
Domingo and Heinonen 2008). The roles assumed by these different actors are fuzzy,
dispersed (Ringoot and Utard 2005), and sometimes intertwined. Boundaries separating
professional journalists from other news producers retain their relevance to understand
the concerns of professional journalists working in traditional media (Aubert 2008;
Coddington 2012; Eldridge 2014), but large parts of the news now emanate from other
groups of actors, rendering the boundary metaphor inadequate in many cases.
