With the UK gripped by arctic conditions last week there was an almost blanket appeal by almost media outlets for photos and videos.

Yet a visit to Flickr or YouTube would provide any researcher or journalist with a stream of Creative Commons output tagged by location that could be incorporated within their news reporting.
But to date mainstream media has made limited use of social network as a newsgathering source.
One exception is Trinity Mirror owned ncjMedia which has created a Flickr group that it uses as a source of reader images for The Journal’s Your Place Northumberland project.
So why doesn’t mainstream media make greater use of Flickr and YouTube for newsgathering?
Ged Carroll suggested to me over the weekend that mainstream media sourced user generated content (UGC) direct as it was a means of engaging directly with its audience.
Craig McGill said that he thought that mainstream media didn’t make greater use of UGC social networks as it is reluctant to credit third part sources – and that understanding of Creating Commons was limited.