The 12th annual Highway Africa conference takes place this week in Grahamstown, in the Eastern Cape.
A joint venture between the SABC and the Rhodes University School of Journalism and Media Studies, the conference runs over the course of three days and focuses on the advent of citizen journalism.
The organisers are working from the premise that technology has transformed the traditional media landscape, as well as newsrooms.
They quote Dan Gillmor, one of the speakers at this year's conference and author of the book, "We the Media", who says readers are no longer content with just being on the receiving end of the news.
"These readers-turned-reporters are publishing in real-time to a worldwide audience via the Internet," says Gillmor.
According to the organisers, mobile chat services, such as Mxit, can no longer be viewed simply as tools for mobile social networking, as ordinary people are using such platforms to produce and distribute news.
In addition, over the past few years, ordinary users of the World Wide Web have taken advantage of the increasing popularity of new media, they say. According to them, instant messaging sites such as Skype, MSN and Yahoo, along with many others, have shifted the function of the Internet by enabling Internet users to generate content.
Deputy communications minister Roy Padayachie is one of the keynote speakers at this year's Highway Africa. The programme also features a debate, hosted by the SABC, on the state of readiness for the 2010 Soccer World Cup.
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