“User-generated content” - it’s an ugly way of describing the great materials that communities contribute to the websites of their newspapers - whether comments, images, or entire stories.

Jonathan Dube, the editorial director of the Canadian Broadcast Corporation website at CBC.ca, founder and publisher of cyberjournalist.net, and incoming president of Online News Association [ONA], outlined three useful ways for categorizing User Generated Content at a panel session today at the American Society of Newspaper Editors [ASNE]’s 2007 Convention in Washington, DC.

Supplementary

• Content that is independent from news coverage, often not edited, and often low in news value
• Examples: Reader-uploaded images at the Tampa Tribune Snap.TBO.com, video-uploads at Boston.com

Integrated

• Content enhances journalism, is integrated into journalist coverage, and is often high on news value, such as eyewitness accounts
• Examples: The BBC received many images during the London Bombings from citizens, and the Fort-Myers News Press
  “crowd-sources” articles by eliciting reader reports [example].

Stand Alone

• New journalism products created with user content, that are standalone and distinct from legacy products.
• Examples: YourHub.com, My.Tennessean.com, IndyMoms.com, Vita.mn

Many alts are already incorporating supplementary user-generated content by adding comments, and soliciting reader photos via their Flickr accounts. What ideas do you have for integrating user content on alt sites? And could stand alone user generated sites have any place in the alt universe?