Citizen Journalism

So citizen journalism is basically the whole idea of people starting blogs, uploading videos onto sites like YouTube, getting their opinions and stories out there without having to worry about deadlines or censorship from editors like professional journalists would.
One definite advantage to citizen journalism is the fact that these days, you get one company owning several different newspapers and magazines, e.g. Rupert Murdoch. He owns,like 70% of the media or something like that? The Telegraph, New Idea, etc.
I, personally, think it's a little bit pointless having all these different newspapers if they're all owned by the same person. You might as well just have the one paper and be done with it. Doesn't it kind of miss the whole point of media diversity? If newspapers were all separate, then we'd get lots of different points of view. I mean, sure there are different people writing for each paper , but ultimately, if they write something Murdoch doesn't agree with, he can refuse to print it.

So I guess the whole idea of citizen journalism is kind of cool in that sense. It takes the power away from these mega-corporations that, to an extent, control what we think, and it allows real people to put their points of view out there and connect with others that share the same point of view.

On the other hand, speaking as a Communications student who actually wants to get into journalism, is it possible that by the time I finish uni,my degree will be completely obsolete? Are bloggers going to replace journalists?
Surely there's a reason we spend three years in this degree learning how to write articles. Is the quality of a blog really going to be equal to that of something written by a journalist? This blog on The Age site called Citizen sums it up pretty well. Journalism does seem to be a profession where you work hard and get very little respect. Apparently journalism is one of the most hated professions, even more hated than lawyers. But I agree with what this blog says:

'...when was the last time you encountered a "citizen doctor", valued a report by a "citizen researcher", took off in a plane flown by a "citizen pilot" or saw justice meted out by "citizen policeman"?'

I don't think citizen/online journalism will replace newspapers and magazines, but that's not do say it's pointless or doesn't have a purpose. Even if it's not exactly journalism, it still gets people thinking about different points of view that don't always get represented in the media, and in a world where one billionaire owns about twenty different newspapers, it's probably the closest thing we've got to media diversity.