The purpose of this study is to examine Ohmynews, an online newspaper site in South Korea, as a precursor of participatory journalism and to explore its discourse in light of Habermas’ conception of the public sphere.

Under Habermas’ theorization, the public sphere is a discursive arena where people actively participate in social discussions and debates in a free and open manner. Textual analysis was employed to examine news texts and news production structure of the company. The study found possible evidence of a public sphere in this online newspaper, but the evidence was not strong enough to support the assumption that Habermas’ public sphere exists on the Internet.