Curation as an act of journalism

In September 2020, I started a site called Portland Protest News. Its purpose was to be a daily collection of what I considered to be the best reporting and analysis over the past 24 hours on the subject of the protests in Portland, Oregon. The site focused primarily on local news sources, as I considered those the people closest to the action. However, I included links to posts/articles from other sources if they were bringing out aspects of the protests not covered in the local media.

In creating and running this site, I was not generating any original reporting on events concerning the Portland protests. However, I feel that my activity did fit within Wikipedia’s definition of journalism:

Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on current events based on facts and supported with proof or evidence.

I was filling the “distribution” role in the above definition. However, I was also performing these roles (per Mindy McAdams):

1. Selection of the best representatives: If a museum curator has access to 10,000 small clay tokens from ancient Iraq and Syria, how many — and which ones — should appear inside the glass case? If a journalist is going to provide links to reliable sources about planning for retirement (or breast cancer, or choosing a college), which are the best, clearest, and most up-to-date?
2. Culling: How many links is enough, and not too much? If the museum curator puts 100 of those tokens in one case, my eyes will glaze over.
3. Provide context: Will you include a bit of explanatory text to show me how each source differs from the others? Why am I looking at this one? Where is it from? How old is it? Why is this one significant?

The Online Journalism Blog also touches on curation:

Curation is a relatively new term in journalism, but the practice is as old as journalism itself. Every act of journalism is an act of curation: think of how a news report or feature selects and combines elements from a range of sources (first hand sources, background facts, first or second hand colour). Not only that: every act of publishing is, too: selecting and combining different types of content to ensure a news or content ‘mix’.

Where I am going with this? Here is my point: when someone collects links on a topic, that is an act of journalism. It is a type of journalism that all of us can pursue and make contributions.