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Anyone with a smartphone can capture a story and become a ‘citizen journalist’.

Citizen journalists are members of the public who find themselves on the scene of events before journalists arrive. They record or film events and may break stories, by posting on social media platforms like Youtube or Twitter.

Examples of stories which have broken this way include the Arab Spring of 2011, the Occupy Wall Street movement, the 2013 protests in Turkey and the civil unrest in Ukraine in 2014.

However, because citizen journalists are not trained or accountable to any organisation or regulator, their information is less reliable and must be handled with care.

^{Anyone can break a story if they find themselves on the scene, as it happens. All they need is a smartphone}