Today CNN is expected to announce the launch of CNN Exchange - a section in its website that will feature not only user-submitted videos, but audios and articles as well! In short, it will be CNN’s first experimentation with citizen journalism that is exciting many an entrepreneur’s mind these days.



In all probability, the owner of the content would be CNN. YouTube has recently announced that all the content hosted by it is owned by it and users should agree to it before uploading any video.



Now the question arises why should you and I be contributing with content (many of whom may be of real news value like rare video footages, scoops etc.) to the cause of an already established media behemoth who will be making money with my contribution. Why wouldn’t you and I contribute in newer Web 2.0 media like NewsCloud and NowPublic that hardly make any money with the content that community users share with each other? There are 100s of such citizen journalism sites.



So what is CNN banking upon for success? Is it its brand image? Does it sincerely hope to attract citizen journalists with the bait that his/her contribution might just feature in a reputed news organization like CNN? Well, I must agree that this has its charm of its own. No matter, how much we may loathe the moneymaking biggies out there, yet we always had some kind of fascination to be a part of them.



But then, only fascination to be associated with a behemoth is not enough. Will CNN be paying anything to the contributors? If I had an item of real value, or to have it burnt some midnight oil or spent money, I would certainly expect a company like CNN to adequately compensate me for my work, luck or whatever. Unless that happens, my contribution would always go to the newer and often non-commercial players. The satisfaction to contribute with quality content to those CJ platforms far outweigh the satisfaction that you might get contributing your big story to a big company making hundreds of millions and don’t have a penny to spare for you.



In any case, the human psychology is inclined to support the underdog. What do you say?