Mamun Shohag: The world is in your hands today. Mobile journalism has made it easier and easier. It can be broadcast live or video from one place to the whole world in an instant. Nowadays the word ‘viral’ is becoming very familiar. Being viral has also been possible for the benefit of smartphones. However, there are a number of tools needed for ‘mobile journalist’ or mojo for short and its proper use.
A mobile journalist can easily use any other portable digital device to make a mojo. For example, he can use a smartphone instead of a DSLR camera to take pictures, because these cameras are not ready for taking pictures everywhere. So smartphones are mainly used as a primary device in mobile journalism.
Modern smartphones are very good at taking pictures, editing pictures, making videos, interviewing people. Although, many mobile journalists use laptops to edit their news. But despite all this, the main focus of mobile journalism is a smartphone.
The whole world is under house arrest for the Corona Virus. Millions of people are dying. And this list also includes journalists. In the time of crisis mobile phone or smartphone journalism has become an essential tool for the media in exchanging information. So as a small media worker, I think to enter mobile journalism in a matter of days. This is the future of the youth, their good days.
In Bangladesh, too, offices and courts have been closed due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, and many are also avoiding printed newspapers coming through hawkers as the disease is contagious. As a result, newspaper sales in Dhaka have dropped by almost half, according to a recent report on bdnews24.com. Due to its small size, the use of mobile phone journalism in any big event or crisis situation is incomparable. And now the number of smartphone users in the country is over two crore. As a result, 'mobile journalism' needs to be restored at this time.
Mobile journalists make big mistakes when they want to imitate television journalism. They think that if you can do it like television, if you can do it like a television presenter, you will be successful. But mobile journalism is not that. The point is, you have to be creative. Creating professional media content for journalism, especially for the broadcast media, requires knowledge of the real art of ‘smartphone filming’. Influential media outlets such as CNN, BBC and Al-Jazeera host training workshops on mobile journalism.
Mobile journalism has not yet gained full recognition in our country. Because the amount of care that is needed for this, but in some parts of the country has not yet begun. In order to create a large number of mobile journalists, regular training workshops have to be organized in this regard in order to increase the quality. Later, they will make a lot of YouTube content, Facebook content and will also earn dollars from there. Only then I believe that the crisis of journalism in the country will be overcome soon.
Writter: Multimedia reporter, Bangladesh Journal
somoyjournal/MI
