Citizen journalism vs. Citizen Power

I read Shamir's post and I agree that the London Bombings (LB) are a great story for a documentary.
However, I think that is not easy to fit such event into the documentary that we decided to do.
The LB are an excellent story of citizen journalism, but I am not sure that whether such event demonstrates the empowerment of people in the democratic game.

As far as I see it, citizen journalism means journalism made by ordinary people. That is to say, the gathering and revelation of information being virtually made by all, instead of being limited to the narrow group of the journalists.
More citizen journalism means that more information will be gathered, from more sources, in more places and situations.
However, it doesnt necessarily mean that those citizens who become journalists have more power.

Nonetheless, lets try to "save" the story and fit it into our documentary:

1. the first thing to do is to agree upon what means empowerment. considering our discussions, I would say that: empowerment means having a more decisive role in the democratic process.

2. In my opinion, the democratic process has 3 or 4 different stages: (i) acquisition of information, (ii) discussion - which includes (iia) presentation of proposals, (iib) and argumentation and discussion of proposals -, and (iii) deliberation.
(the process is circular: after every deliberation the agents are suposed to gather information about, and discuss, the execution or not of the deliberation, its impact, new facts that may require new deliberation; and,
the process is not necessarily formal: most of the blogs that discuss politics or policies fit mostly in the (ii) stage, but can also fit in the (i) stage to the extent they reveal information relevant to the democratic process);

3. I think that the type of citizen journalism in London Bombings fits mostly in the (i) stage. Citizens got more powerfull, because they used technologies to disclose very relevant events (to the society and the democratic process).
Citizen journalism like such in LB (where people mostly gather information) adds a very important news-source to the demoratic process.
A story like LB doesnt assure that we will have more proposals or discussion of proposals in our society. But it may demonstrate that citizens have a new role in the democratic process: gathering information. Citizens are no longer passive and waiting for the class of journalists feed them with information. Citizens became active pieces of the (i) stage of the democratic process. Citizens are empowered because they can really contribute/enhance the democratic debate by fueling its basis: the information.

4. I think that our biggest challenge with the LB story will be to prove that the information gathered by citizens made difference in/really contributed to the democratic process.
I fear that our argument will be weak if we cant demonstrate that effect.
If the information gathered by citizen journalists was irrelevant/not useful for the democratic process, we cant consider that citizen journalists had any power.
In that case the citizen journalism wouldnt mean more than some addition of media material. But no more than that...