Tag Archives: NICAR-L

NICAR launches list for Spanish speaking journalists

Screenshots of La Nacion, ICIJ

The list already boasts journalists from some of the leading data journalism projects in Latin America

A new data journalism mailing list for Spanish speakers has been launched by The National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting (NICAR) and its parent organisation, Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE), reports Barbara Maseda.

NICAR-ESP-L, as it is called, seeks to be the Spanish version of NICAR-L, a mailing list in English that has been active for over 20 years. Continue reading

5 tips for a data journalism workflow: part 2 – anticipating problems and collaboration

In my last post I wrote about how using feeds and social bookmarking can make for a quicker data journalism workflow. In this second part I look at how to anticipate and prevent problems; and how collaboration can improve data work.

Workflow tip 3. Anticipate problems

A particularly useful habit of successful data journalists is to think ahead in the way you request data. For example, you might want to request basic datasets now that you think you’ll need in future, such as demographic details for local patches.

You might also want to request the ‘data dictionary‘ for key datasets. This lists all the fields used in a particular database. For example, did you know that the police have a database for storing descriptions of suspects? And that one of the fields is shoe size? That could make for quite a quirky story. Continue reading