“I believe too many of us editors and reporters are out of touch with our readers,” Rupert Murdoch, the boss of News Corporation, one of the world's largest media companies, told the American Society of Newspaper Editors last week. No wonder that people, and in particular the young, are ditching their newspapers. Today's teens, twenty- and thirty-somethings “don't want to rely on a god-like figure from above to tell them what's important,” Mr. Murdoch said, “and they certainly don't want news presented as gospel.” And yet, he went on, “as an industry, many of us have been remarkably, unaccountably, complacent.”

6 / 15 /2005 - San Francisco, California/Montreal, Qc. - RushPRnews (http://www.rushprnews.com) is looking for citizen journalists to publish articles and press releases for the RushPRnews Daily Gazette (http://rushprnews.iuplog.com). Articles of interest to small and minority-owned businesses and press releases will be posted for free once facts checking is completed. Also, social activists and environmental groups are welcome to submit announcements. Articles will be seen on Google, Yahoo and MSN News. There are no fees to post but also no payments made. There are no geographical limitations.

"We are hoping to give a voice for business-owners and activists through this free publication and as a result increase their visibility and make themselves heard," says Anne Laszlo- Howard, President of RushPRnews. "We have a firm commitment to small businesses and social issues and are focusing on this market-segment. Also as a woman working in new media technology, a men-dominated industry, I had to develop a real thick skin to be able to move forward and wanted to create a place for others to share ideas". Citizen journalism, also known as "participatory journalism," is the act of citizens "playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information," according to the seminal report We Media: How Audiences are Shaping the Future of News and Information, by Shayne Bowman and Chris Willis. They say, "The intent of this participation is to provide independent, reliable, accurate, wide-ranging and relevant information that a democracy requires."

Anne Howard, a public relations veteran who has worked for the past 15 years in New York, San Francisco and Montreal has firmly embraced this concept. She is currently working with several firms to expand RushPRnews’ web presence and to form strategic partnership, such as the two recently announced with AskCommunications, Alberta and Rampell Software, Florida. For more information about The Daily Gazette and RushPRnews services visit www.rushprnews.com. For greater details about forming strategic partnership please write anne@rushprnews.com.