Citizen journalist

A new company called Scoopt helps ordinary people market their photos to news organizations. A story by Reuters posted on Yahoo News says new Internet businesses aim to get citizen shutterbugs paid for their wares, much of which were eventually splashed across newspaper and Web front pages worldwide following the London bombings.

The Reuters story says that "Scoopt, a Web-based service that markets user-contributed photos to media organizations on its web site, was launched in August with little fanfare to fill the void. Less than two months later, MacRae is now joined by two new companies in the United States aiming to profit from the natural inclination of regular citizens to document their surroundings. Like Scoopt, Spy Media, co-founded by Tom Quinn, a former president of software company Novell Inc., and Cell Journalist see an opportunity from the proliferation of cameraphones and the desire of readers and viewers to play a role in news gathering."