CNN’s iReport is turning five this week, and the channel is planning to celebrate with an expansion of the service.
“As we saw during the Virginia Tech massacre, the earthquake in Haiti, the protests in Iran and the tsunami in Japan, the images and videos submitted to iReport were some of the earliest and defining images of these events, as well as a powerful complement to our reporting,” wriote CNN Worldwide president Jim Walton in an email to staff.
In addition to a redesign of the iReport website slated for later this year, CNN is launching an iReport app for Android phones. The app will be able to “assign” stories based on the location of the user, so if someone was three blocks away from a protest or water main break, the app could alert the user to that fact, encouraging them to check it out and snap pictures or video.
CNN chose to launch the app first on Android because research suggested that a large number of regular iReport contributors used Android phones.
Walton’s memo to staff is after the jump.
To: Colleagues
From: Jim Walton
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This week marks the fifth anniversary of CNN iReport, the first sustained digital citizen journalism effort inside an established news organization. On average, 2.4 million users around the world use iReport each month to submit and view first-hand accounts of breaking news stories in real time. As we saw during the Virginia Tech massacre, the earthquake in Haiti, the protests in Iran and the tsunami in Japan, the images and videos submitted to iReport were some of the earliest and defining images of these events, as well as a powerful complement to our reporting.
In the coming months, we will extend iReport to new platforms. Today, we are announcing the launch of our first iReport App, exclusive to Android phones, and CNN.com soon will unveil a newly reimagined iReport that builds on the experience and success of the last five years.
Please join me in congratulating the iReport and CNN Digital teams on a great start and a promising future.