CNN has plans to supplement their staff with non-traditional (read: not real) reporters, who will gather all their newsiest news armed only with a laptop and their bookmarks to The Drudge Report. Typically we call these people bloggers, but what do we know, we would never have called Richard Quest a reporter either and apparently he is.

Don't think that CNN is just old and confused and is using terms like "all-platform journalists" to describe what is essentially free labor. CNN already has their real anchors blogging like a fifteen year old girl on her Livejournal (if they had Livejournal over Myanmar). CNN also already has a group of bloggers on their payroll who's job it is to be on the internet all day. So who are these new-new reporters? CNN is angling for one of those Huffington Post things, where people submit stuff for recognition instead of, you know, money.

From the Reuters article: "Everyone's a reporter now," Nancy Lane, senior vice president of newsgathering for CNN/U.S., said in an interview. "Even our viewers."

Dunno about that Nancy, not all bloggers are reporters (reporting being an ostensibly objective act, or did that go out the window when you hired Lou Dobbs?) and most bloggers are not objective, because it's the internet and people can do whatever they want. And will flattering your viewers by calling them reporters really convince them to send you all their precious Youtube videos of silly cats? On second thought yes, that is exactly what is going to happen. Have fun sorting that out, CNN.