I’ve been watching with great anticipation the development of Jay Rosen’s New Assignment.net project since he began discussing starting it last year. Rosen, a media critic, author and professor at NYU’s School of Journalism is one of the most insightful observers of how news and journalism is changing on the Web, particularly in relation to the rise of blogs and citizen journalism (or what Jeff Jarvis is now calling “networked journalism“).

His New Assignment.net endeavor is a project that combines the efforts of hundreds of amateurs (bloggers, citizen journalists) spread out over the country, along with some professional guidance and editing as a new form of journalism, with the hopes that tapping into the efforts of so many committed people (over 900 volunteers at the moment) can ultimately produce a better form of reporting than traditional approaches.

The initial endeavor for his project (which is supported by a $100,000 grant from Reuters), was called Assignment Zero, and looked at the promise, benefits, and pitfalls of “crowdsourcing“, with the results to be published in Wired magazine, and has a special emphasis on Citizendium, an attempt to improve on Wikipedia “by adding ‘gentle expert oversight’ and requiring contributors to use their real names.”

The first installment is out today, titled “Wiki Innovators Rethink Openness“and although it is just an initial draft, it looks quite intriguing and is worth following closely, both on the topic itself, as well as this new form of journalism.

If you’re interested in the future of news and journalism, I’d pay close attention to whatever Jay Rosen says as well as the direction of his projects, particularly this one…