Dominika Popielec

A whistleblower is a person who publicizes and denounces illegal or unfair practices in his workplace. As history has shown, whistleblowers are great sources of information for journalists. A few examples being Daniel Ellsberg, who was at the forefront of the scandal concerning the Pentagon Papers and Mark Felt, who was a whistleblower involved in the Watergate scandal. Without people like Daniel Ellsberg and Mark Felt, it would be impossible to present and explain some of the biggest 20th century political scandals in the United States. The aim of the paper is to analyze the role of key whistleblowers and other key people who played an important role in disclosing that information to  journalists through the use of databases and other forms of new technologies. The overall concept of what will be referred to as ‘second generation whistleblowing’ is the result of observations and analysis of the activities of both whistleblowers as well as dynamically changing journalism, media and information in the 21st century.

"Social Media Muckraking" on the Example of the Documentary Film Don't Tell Anyone - Characteristics and Directions of Impact 

In this paper the author has analyzed the phenomenon of investigative journalism in social media on the example of Tomasz Sekielski, which was defined by the author’s term “social media muckraking”. Muckraking, which dates back to the so-called “golden age of journalism” in the United States is one of the most ennobling terms for investigative journalism. The proposed term is the result of observing the increasingly popular practice of using social media in the work of an investigative re­porter also in the context of increasing publicity of the pedophile theme among priests, which was presented in the documentary film Do Not Tell Anyone. Therefore, social media content analysis and case study were used. As a result of the analysis, it was found that the activity of Tomasz Sekielski reflects the nature of the concept of “social media muckraking” which is one of the possibilities of practicing investigative journalism in the era of new technologies.