Backpack Journalism

When I read some entertainment news online this morning, I suddenly realized that convergence or backpack journalism has been in my daily life for several years.
The story I read is about a famous Chinese singer who was suspect of drug-taking. The journalist provided a short video clip, some photos of this singer, and a detailed report about the whole incident. After reading this story, I realized that backpack journalism has given me most of the information I need in my life. Because of the daily experiences with backpack journalism, I couldn’t agree with Jane Stevens more-- “in a few years, backpack journalists will not only be the rule, they'll rule.”
After emergence of the Internet in people’s life, newspaper and television are not the only sources of information any more. More and more people like to read news online. To serve these online readers better, backpack journalism, no doubt, is the best choice for all of the journalists. As Stevens said in this article, multimedia storytelling presents stories in nonlinear format, and readers can easily comment on stories. I think these are the aspects that traditional media cannot reach. Therefore, the media convergence must be an irreversible trend, and I believe more people will like to obtain information with the combination of traditional and new media. As journalism students, it is important to be ready for the age of backpack journalism.