Response to week 5 reading 'Ohmynews in South Korea'.

The ingenious creator of Ohmynews, Oh Yeon-ho really was thinking ahead when his idea for an online news site came to life in 2002. What a fantastic idea to create a space where stories or articles are gathered from a vast array of sources all over the world.

Oh's idea that 'every citizen is a reporter' was revolutionary and has only snowballed since then. The concept of providing a platform for any would-be journalist to display their writing talents has proven hugely successful with over 60,000 citizen reporters who provide content. The success of the site is evident with reviews that highlight its appeal.

Director of OhmyNews International, Jean Min says that the goal is to combine traditional journalism with citizen journalism. In the case of OhmyNews, the 65+ fulltime staff must be able to perform multiple roles. Reporters need to know how to edit and editors need to know how to write. It's not about just being a reporter and submitting a story and then moving onto the next one. Community journalism is unique therefore everyone needs to be multi-skilled to adapt to the medium.

While speaking at the Media 08 conference in Sydney in March this year, Jean Min discussed the success of OhmyNews and how important it is to understand your audience because at the end of the day, they are the content.