WOS: 000443598800002 ; The term "data journalism" arrived to newsrooms some time ago, and now every news media wants be part of it. In a small country like Uruguay - despite the isolated efforts of some companies, NGOs and government agencies - it has still not found its place in the media. This research tries to clarify the concept of data journalism in order to break down the state of the art in Uruguay, through interviews with journalists, members of NGOs and members of the academic staff of the universities where the future journalists are being formed. Thus being able to point out the impulses and obstacles data journalism has encountered in order to foresee its possible future.
The combined set of skills needed for producing data journalism (e.g., investigative journalism methods, programming, knowledge in statistics, data management, statistical reporting, and design) challenges the understanding of what competences a journalist needs and the boundaries for the tasks journalists perform. Scholars denote external actors with these types of knowledge as interlopers or actors at the periphery of journalism. In this study, we follow two Swedish digital native data journalism start-ups operating in the Nordics from when they were founded in 2012 to 2019. Although the start-ups have been successful in news journalism over the years and acted as drivers for change in Nordic news innovation, they also have a presence in sectors other than journalism. This qualitative case study, which is based on interviews over time with the start-up founders and a qualitative analysis of blog posts written by the employees at the two start-ups, tells a story of journalists working at the periphery of legacy media, at least temporarily forced to leave journalism behind yet successfully using journalistic thinking outside of journalistic contexts.
The purpose of this article is to explain what a digital form of journalism, called data journalism, is and how it is applied in practice related to politics. Definitions and various aspects of data journalism (i.a. exemplary variables, most common in data journalism in general, ways of presenting data, factors that data journalists focus on in their work etc.) appear in the first part of article. Politics, as the title of this work indicates, is one of the areas in which this type of journalism is used. In this article, three projects related to data journalism are described. The first example of a tool, based on American politics, used to visualize and obtain data on congressmen and elections in general, is Election DataBot. This paper provides a description of this tool, as well as information about organizations that launched it. The next two initiatives related to data journalism are: European Data Journalism Network (as the name suggests, it refers to European politics) and Media 3.0 Foundation (related to Polish politics). They offer many practical options to observe, analyze and show political data. The research method used in the study is the analysis of thematic online sources. The hypothesis is that data journalism is still a growing branch of journalism that has its adhibition in politics, thus supporting journalists, researchers and others interested in obtaining and visualizing data.
While data journalism has been the hot topic of various recent reports, no studies have discussed how the changes in journalistic storytelling may create new legal considerations for journalists. This report aims to help journalists, lawyers, and academics understand the changes taking place in media law as a result of both the growing volume of data in our information economy, and the the seismic shifts occurring within journalism and technology. By examining developments in newsgathering law, the Freedom of Information Act, and laws involved in leak investigations, this research underscores worrisome shifts in the law, as well as gray areas where reform would strengthen the rights of a free press and journalists. In its first part, the report looks at emerging concerns over data journalism projects that could trigger the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), 18 U.S.C. §1030(a)(4)i for scraping, a data collection technique that usually relies on automation—through bots, crawlers, or applications—to extract data from a website. As data collection becomes increasingly important for investigative journalists in particular, legal experts worry about civil and criminal penalties that exist under the statute—which has been described by some First Amendment advocates as unconstitutionally vague. In reviewing the history and case law of the CFAA in relationship to journalism, the research offers practical tips and various legal considerations on the issue. Next, the report discusses troubling trends arising under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in the digital age, as the amount of government information held in databases and government logs grows, and the need for transparency is crucial. Lastly, it reviews data's impact on laws affecting whistleblowers. In the past decade, we've seen more leak prosecutions in the United States than all those combined in the country's history. This, of course, occurs at a time when there is more information than ever before for whistleblowers to share.
The study investigates how journalists construct the rise of data journalism discursively within the specific political and economic conditions of Italy, and whether data journalists describe it as able to promote transparency at the level of both journalism and society as a whole. Italy is an interesting case for four different reasons: (1) to date, few analyses have been carried out on Mediterranean countries; (2) the Italian media system and its traditional journalism culture appear to be reluctant to innovate; (3) Italian data journalists are generally freelancers linked to small news agencies rather than established newsrooms; (4) the research reported in this paper was accomplished while the Italian government was approving a Freedom of Information Act. From the end of 2015 to the beginning of 2017, we carried out 15 interviews with data journalists working full-time for both established news organizations and specialized agencies. The findings show that data journalism in Italy is a highly professional sub-field, although journalistic education is not well developed. Data journalism is still largely determined by the availability and accessibility of public datasets. However, data journalists have developed certain strategies with which to generate and collect their own data, for instance collaborations and networks.
Amid digital developments, data journalism has gained a strong foothold among news publishers and in public discourse. With its authoritative claims and informative visualizations, it can play a significant role in the actions of citizens and people in power. This mixed-method case study explores a distinct epistemology developed in an independent form of data journalism in public service media in Scandinavia, not subordinate to traditional news values or investigative journalism. The study investigates its knowledge and truth claims, approach to data, transparency practices, and resources invested to claim reliable knowledge. The epistemology is characterized by innovative practices in the visualizing of essentially prejustified datasets. It claims public value offering general information and audience-friendly explorations of individual perspectives on topics on the public agenda. The approach to data views reality as measurable facts yet indicates epistemic ambiguity regarding figures' reliability, guided by a principle of reasonableness in the justifications of truth claims.
Abstract In the past, journalists were responsible for reporting the news. But today news stories disseminate as the incidents unfold, from multiple sources. Thus, gathering, filtering and visualizing events has a growing value. Huge amounts of data are available, but exploiting them is not an easy task. Data journalism can be defined as a journalism speciality in which numerical data are used in the production and distribution of information. This article investigates the necessary skills that journalists must have in order to cope with data journalism. More precisely, it defines data journalism, and discusses journalists' Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills, as well as the necessary skills for supporting data journalism. Special attention is given to Web 3.0 and open data that can play an important role in data journalism. A survey conducted among professional journalists in Greece concerning data journalism is also presented and discussed.
The democratic government wrote freedom of information into the constitution in reaction to apartheid censorship, yet it remains constantly under threat. The Protection of State Information Bill, known as the 'secrecy bill', has also been a point of contention since 2010. The aim was to regulate state information, weighing state interests against transparency and freedom of expression, but it would have surely restricted journalists, and proposed jail terms for reporters and whistleblowers that revealed classified information. It was approved by parliament in 2013, but has still not yet passed into law. Here, Saba talks about why the government ignored, belittled or taken for granted the freedom of information. Adapted from the source document.
The Data Journalism Handbook: Towards a Critical Data Practice provides a rich and panoramic introduction to data journalism, combining both critical reflection and practical insight. It offers a diverse collection of perspectives on how data journalism is done around the world and the broader consequences of datafication in the news, serving as both a textbook and a sourcebook for this emerging field. With more than 50 chapters from leading researchers and practitioners of data journalism, it explores the work needed to render technologies and data productive for journalistic purposes. It also gives a "behind the scenes" look at the social lives of data sets, data infrastructures, and data stories in newsrooms, media organizations, start-ups, civil society organizations and beyond. The book includes sections on "doing issues with data," "assembling data," "working with data," "experiencing data," "investigating data, platforms and algorithms," "organizing data journalism," "learning data journalism together" and "situating data journalism."
"Data Journalism and the Regeneration of News traces the emergence and flourishing of data journalism through a scholarly lens. It presents evidence of how data journalists are mobilizing discursive, technological and, in well-resourced newsrooms, financial assets, to advance maintenance and regeneration in journalism. The authors base their analysis on three years of in-depth field research in Canada, an example of a mature media system facing decline in for-profit media. They argue that, as a more 'liquid' form of journalism, data journalism has evolved and is evolving with the digitized world of the 21st century. It is a site for the new networks, a blending of journalism, programming and coding, tools and technologies as actants, as well as emergent norms, methods and epistemologies such as collaboration and computational thinking. Data Journalism and the Regeneration of News demonstrates how the multiple crises in journalism have created apertures in long-standing norms and practices for data journalists to advance alternative and novel ways of doing and knowing. The book will introduce an important new dimension to the study of digital journalism for researchers, students and educators"--
The term "data journalism" arrived to newsrooms some timeago, and now every news media wants be part of it. In asmall country like Uruguay —despite the isolated effortsof some companies, NGOs and government agencies— ithas still not found its place in the media. This research triesto clarify the concept of data journalism in order to breakdown the state of the art in Uruguay, through interviewswith journalists, members of NGOs and members of the academicstaff of the universities where the future journalistsare being formed. Thus being able to point out the impulsesand obstacles data journalism has encountered in order toforesee its possible future.Keywords: ; El término periodismo de datos es un término nuevo que llegó a las redacciones hace algunos años, pero ahora ningún medio quiere quedar afuera. En un país pequeño como Uruguay —a pesar de que en todas las redacciones están al tanto de su existencia y ha habido algunas iniciativas— es una práctica que en el año 2015 todavía no ha encontrado su lugar en los medios. Este trabajo busca esclarecer de qué se habla cuando se habla de periodismo de datos para luego, a través de información recabada de medios, organizaciones no gubernamentales y centros educativos, averiguar cuál es su situación actual en el país, los impulsos que ha tenido, los obstáculos que ha encontrado y el futuro que le espera.
Today, the "data journalism" in the global media space has emerged as an independent direction with its own goals, objectives, and specifics. Specialized data departments in large media are increasingly appearing, and reporters working with "Big Data" are called data journalists now. There are studies in the scientific community on the data journalism in the USA, Russia, and European countries, but only a small number of such materials are devoted to data projects in Latin America. Meanwhile the data journalism in that part of the world has been actively developing since 2012, and such publications comply with all standards of high-quality analytical material. The article is based on an analysis of the data journalism of the three countries, Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, because their projects regularly receive prestigious awards and are recognized by the international community. In particular issues of the thematic diversity of the data materials, work methodology, format features of publications are considered.
