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CNN jumps on video-sharing bandwagon
Calling all citizen journalists...

By Greg Sandoval

Published: Monday 31 July 2006

CNN wants some of the clips being uploaded to popular video-sharing sites, such as YouTube, to find their way to the cable news channel.

It is today expected to announce the launch of CNN Exchange, a page on the company's website that will feature user-submitted video, audio and articles.

The pioneer in 24-hour news broadcasting is coming to user-submitted video at a time when citizen journalism has sparked much fanfare. The trend began with text - ordinary people in the blogosphere commenting about news events or in some instances, reporting breaking news stories.

The next stage in citizen journalism appears to involve lenses and viewfinders.

Video-sharing sites, such as Grouper, Guba, Revver and YouTube have become online warehouses for war footage from Chechnya, Iraq and Lebanon.

As part of CNN's coverage of the fighting in Lebanon earlier this month, the cable channel showed clips it found on YouTube. The videos were taken by citizens as they rushed into bomb shelters or witnessed rockets crashing into buildings.

Mitch Gelman, senior vice president and executive producer for CNN.com, said in a statement: "User-generated content has the potential to play a pivotal role in journalism whether it's online or offline. With CNN Exchange, we've essentially created a one-stop shop for CNN.com users to share their contributions with other internet users."

Greg Sandoval writes for CNET News.com