How User-generated content affects on line professional journalism. An experimental monitoring

The paper intends to analyze the relationship between professional and user-generated content in the context of the Italian daily press. The Italian publishing market is living now - and increasingly through the introduction of mobile devices - the transition from paper to digital. Beyond the logistical and organizational implications of the two crucial points of this transition represented by the construction of a sustainable economic model - in a web perceived as free, and the relationship between the professional journalism - and world of content production bottom-up or user-generated. The article explores the Italian context from an experimental approach conducted monitoring the main titles of newspapers online in November 2009. The experiment was intended to determinate which is the role of citizens journalism in professional publications and how its participation effects in redefining the role of journalists themselves. The results suggest the idea of possible interpretation of the phenomenon and its impact on the profession, especially during the final transition between the generation of so-called digital immigrants and digital natives.