This month, significant developments have taken place in citizen journalism. There’s no longer any doubt that audience participation is maturing; citizen reporting is on its way to become part and parcel of the established media. Handsome amounts of cash are being paid for platforms gathering reports by mere mortals who relay first hand experiences of events to the world. Associated Content landed $10 million in financing earlier this month from Canaan Partners. At the same time, NowPublic raked in $10.6 million Rho Ventures. So what are winning strategies for newsroom editors in dealing with the citizen platforms?

It’s time to map the landscape. Who is out there and what’s on offer for newsroom editors? And how do editors tackle problems here?

Some 45% of editors in the US use citizen journalism tools and techniques, according to a recent study on behalf of the Pew Center and the Associated Press Managing Editors. Editors considering using citizen journalism amount to 66% of the survey’s respondents.

There are two problem that people encounter; the sheer number of participants is way larger than they have the resources for and the efforts often are focused on special projects rather than a consistent feature in reporting.