China's state-run news agency was forced to give an apology about two weeks ago for publishing a doctored photo of rare antelope near a train. The significance of the doctored photo -- it has something to do with environmental propoganda -- is important, but not quite as interesting as finding out who discovered the photo was fake: basically a blogger.
Suspicions about the photo became public last week after Mr. Liu's photograph was displayed in Beijing's subway system. An anonymous Chinese Internet user going by the screen name Dajiala raised questions about the photo's authenticity on one of China's largest photography Web sites. Dajiala, a photographer who claimed to idolize Mr. Liu, said he was studying a copy of the photo posted on Beijing's Line 5 subway platform when he rubbed some dust off it and noticed something odd.
"At the bottom of the photograph, there was a very obvious line," he wrote. "I examined it very carefully and it was obviously the stitching of two different images....Was this decisive moment just a simple Photoshop trick?"
His post created an online storm. Photographers blew up the image and analyzed each out-of-place pixel. Animal behaviorists weighed in, explaining that antelope are shy and noise-sensitive, and would scatter in panic at the sound of the high-speed train. When the chat-room controversy spread to China's largest Internet portals, the Chengdu Business Daily confronted Mr. Liu.
What makes this example of citizen journalism in action even more impressive is that censorship of the internet appears to be common in China. Would-be bloggers and other internet users there don't have the unlimited freedom of exploration Americans -- thus far -- still have with the world wide web. That didn't prevent this incident, however, which is another excellent example of citizen journalism serving as a watchdog of traditional media.
1 comment:
I wonder if bloggers will be able to tell truths from the Olympic games?
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