It's all about sources

Interesting column from Siobhain Butterworth, the Guardian's readers' editor, on journalists and legal protection.
Journalists love to set themselves apart from the masses - and being able to claim some high-falutin' public interest defence for nosing around in peoples' rubbish bins is seen as one of the perks of the job.
But Butterworth quotes Clay Shirky that, with the rise of citizen journalism, how can this protection be extended to, well, everybody.
As he says:

"If anyone can be a publisher, then anyone can be a journalist. And if anyone can be a journalist, then journalistic privilege suddenly becomes a loophole too large to be borne by society."

As ever, the law lags behind technology.
Do you need to qualify for legal protection, and if so how? Does my NUJ membership (and consequently signing up for its code of conduct) give me rights over well-meaning but non-union bloggers? Are gatekeepers becoming redundant?
Perhaps the rights of journalists will become the rights for anyone who takes a mature role in civil society. If you can prove your actions are well-intended and carried out in as professional a manner as possible you deserve some legal protection. You are simply exercising your rights as a citizen to scrutinise society.