Category: Article

Article, Opinion, Resource

A dossier of data journalism teaching strategies: Words from journalism educators worldwide

This is a repost from https://datajournalism.com/read/longreads/a-dossier-of-data-journalism-teaching-strategies

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“It doesn’t matter which country you’re in, or what university you visit, there’s a common refrain that you’ll hear in the halls of J-schools across the globe: “I’m not good at math”.

Of course, this aversion often leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy. If students don’t think they’re good at numbers, they avoid them altogether. Yet, to find and accurately report on stories in today’s data intensive society, journalists need these skills.

This calls for a reconsideration of journalism programmes around the world. Teachers need to ask themselves: What are the most relevant strategies to equip students with the skills required for finding facts in datasets? To understand them? To scrutinise them? And to communicate them to the public in the most appropriate and understandable manner?

There’s a lot to be learnt from teachers of all backgrounds. So, in this Long Read, we’ve curated a dossier of reflections from nine educators in seven countries to start understanding the most effective ways to introduce students to data.” Continue reading “A dossier of data journalism teaching strategies: Words from journalism educators worldwide” →

Article, Opinion, Resource

“Whoah, wait a minute, every reporter needs to be a data reporter”: Conversations with two generations of data journalists at the Los Angeles Times

By Roselyn Du

Over the entrance to the Los Angeles Times headquarters hangs a banner with the newspaper’s promise to the world: REAL JOURNALISM, REAL IMPACT. When I visited in April 2018, the paper was still quietly situated in its historic downtown Los Angeles headquarters, right next to the City Hall and the Grand Park. Three months later, the paper moved out of its historic downtown building to a facility near Los Angeles International Airport, bringing itself closer to the rest of the nation in the latest episode in a series of ownership changes that have been going on for decades. I went there in search of a pair of data journalists, Doug Smith and Ben Welsh, who relayed to me a remarkable story of the evolution of data journalism in recent decades.

Continue reading ““Whoah, wait a minute, every reporter needs to be a data reporter”: Conversations with two generations of data journalists at the Los Angeles Times” →

Article, Opinion, Resource

Aaron Mendelson: Would numbers work with radio?

Producer/Editor: Roselyn Du

Project Assistant: Zoe Hu

(Aaron Mendelson at his KPCC desk in Pasadena, California. He was interviewed by Roselyn Du of Hong Kong Baptist University in February 2019 for his data journalism works.)

Aaron Mendelson can usually be found working on one radio broadcast or another in his office at Pasadena, California. Where most journalists work with verbal content, Mendelson also concerns himself with data analysis. He is thankful to his master’s degree from UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. He said the data skills that he is now using at work for Southern California Public Radio’s data journalism and interactive projects are mostly learnt from there. Continue reading “Aaron Mendelson: Would numbers work with radio?” →

Article, Opinion, Resource

Matt Carroll: Numbers Man in the Spotlight
Producer/Editor: Roselyn Du
Project Assistants: Zoe Hu/Bobo Wei

(Matt Carroll interviewed by Roselyn Du and her students at Hong Kong Baptist University in 2018)

Matt Carroll was in Hong Kong in October 2018. He was invited to be a keynote speaker for the week-long Pulitzer Prize Winners Workshop (PPWW) held at Hong Kong Baptist University. The rooms where he spoke were always more than full, with some people having to stand at the aisles or sit on the floor.

Movie effects? Perhaps. But Matt Carroll himself is really a personable, charismatic, and charming character. Continue reading “Matt Carroll: Numbers Man in the Spotlight” →

Article, Opinion

黄志敏与数可视：数据新闻的过去、现在和未来

出品/采访：Roselyn Du

拟稿/整理：Zoe Hu

资料协助：Jiayuan Wen & Miao Xu

（黄志敏是前财新传媒首席技术官（CTO）、财新数据可视化实验室创始人，曾在数据新闻领域获得多项国际和国内大奖，包括连续三年四次获“亚洲新闻奖”、获得全球最佳数据新闻网站提名等，被称为“中国数据新闻第一人”。）

（黄志敏在GEN Summit 2018 年会现场；左为香港浸会大学Roselyn Du）

2011年，可以说是中国数据新闻的“元年”。

这一年，黄志敏加入财新，之后于2013年开始从事数据新闻相关工作。作为目前国内数据新闻媒体的领头羊，财新“数字说”（由“财新数据可视化实验室”出品）从2011年至今，经历了从无到有的重大变换。期间，财新的数项报道在国际和国内获得SOPA，SND等多个奖项，不仅树立了数据新闻在国内新闻领域的地位，也让国内在短短数年间意识到数据新闻在行业中的发展潜力。

2016年，是黄志敏在财新的第五年，离“财新数据可视化实验室”的创立也有三年的时间。这一年，他离开财新，创办了中国“数可视”。 Continue reading “黄志敏与数可视：数据新闻的过去、现在和未来” →

Article

The Conservation of the Fish Industry

By Jay Raju Ganglani

According to the WWF, Hong Kong citizens consume 65.5 kilograms of seafood each year making it three times more than the world’s average. 

In 2017 alone, the fishing industry produced approximately 127,600 tonnes of fisheries believed to be valued at $2.6 billion. 

In recent years, however, the Hong Kong government has implemented a number of measures to help promote the conservation of fishes and other marine life animals. Continue reading “The Conservation of the Fish Industry” →

Article, Event, Story

The Spreadsheet Guy in “Spotlight”

MattCaroll

Hong Kong Baptist University journalism students interviewing Pulitzer Prize winner Matt Carroll in Hong Kong. Read the The Young Reporter short story here: https://m.facebook.com/tyrmag/photos/a.576662715691596/2139831466041372/?type=3&theater=

 

 

Article, Resource, Tool

[Tools] Online Verification Tools – Notes from Google @ GEN 2018

At this year’s GEN (Global Editors Network) summit, Google News Initiative shared their notes regarding data journalism resources, particularly for investigative research and verification by online forensics. Here are some excerpts and we get a copy from Google News Lab, which you may find the complete notes attached at the end.

Research Tools

  • Google Public Data Explorer provides public data and forecasts from a range of international organizations and academic institutions. Visualized data are ready to interpret.
  • Google Trends compares search terms in a country and timeframe of your choice.

Verification Tools

Find more on data journalism training and multimedia toolsets below:

Q2 2018_ Workshop Notes 2018

Article, Story

第六屆香港立法會投票記錄分析（2016-2018）

本屆立法會波瀾起伏，6名議員先後被取消資格（俗稱「DQ」）。時值2018年3月補選之際，我們進行該項研究，通過本屆投票記錄的數據，爲公衆還原各議員的「政治肖像」。從這份數據驅動的光譜與投票熱力圖，我們可以看出，議員們究竟是言行一致，還是逢場作戲。在公衆熱烈討論「投票率新低」和「田忌賽馬失敗」之餘，我們也要知道，誰當選固然重要，當選後做什麼也許更加值得關注，會議的提案與投票記錄詳細地反應了議員的行爲。

議員投票傾向光譜

從第五屆立法會開始，電子投票記錄以XML結構化數據的形式公佈於網站上，供公衆下載。我們通過爬蟲蒐集第六屆立法會議員從2016年11月10日至2018年3月29日做出的電子投票記錄，共27426票紀錄，對於每個議案，議員可能產生五種不同的表決結果——贊成、反對、棄權、缺席或出席（即出席會議，但未投下「贊成」、「反對」或「棄權」中的任何一票；立法會小百科 ）。將不同的表決結果數值化後，使用主成分分析法（Principal Component Analysis，以下簡稱為 PCA），計算2萬票紀錄反映出的最大分歧，即主維度（Principal Axis），記為 PA1。同時我們計算每位議員的投票紀錄在 PA1 上的投影值，即主成分（Principal Component），記爲 PC1。PC1 體現議員之間的相對關係，兩位議員得到的分值越接近，則說明他們的投票傾向也越接近。

按照 PC1 分值由小到大排序，就得到一條數據驅動的「政治光譜」（如下圖所示）。在這條「光譜」中間，是從不投票的梁君彥。越靠近梁君彥的人，投票風格就越溫和。越遠離梁君彥的人，投票風格就越激進。而梁君彥的兩邊，按照議員所屬派別塗色，恰恰是建制和泛民兩派人馬，與常識相符。

1
第六屆立法會（2016-2018）投票傾向光譜（按建制、泛民分類）
（已等比例縮放到第5屆立法會光譜的同等區間）

從相對距離上來看，泛民陣營整體離梁君彥更近，而建制則離得較遠。圖像顯示，建制派整體而言在投票中表現得比泛民更加激進。即建制派的建制立場，要強過泛民的民主立場。

光譜的兩端，分別是鄭松泰和盧偉國，這說明兩人的投票風格差異最大，相比其他議員，他們二者的投票風格最為激進。且根據統計，在投票記錄中，兩人投票意見不相同的提案數（371個）是兩人意見相同提案數量（37個）的十倍之多。

Continue reading “第六屆香港立法會投票記錄分析（2016-2018）” →

Article, Story

Flying in the sky, a report of air crash worldwide

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1/2560000 in 2016  VS.  ?  in history

In the past 70 years, Airplane has been an important tool for people to travel long distances. According to IATA annual report In 2016, the major aviation accident rate was 0.39, which was equivalent to only one major accident happen in every 2.56 million flights. This seemingly safe number is built on countless blood and sweat. Step down and turn back a little bit, let’s count the successes and failures in the flying history.

Data source

Data volume

  • 5534

Questions

  1. Yearly how many planes crashed? any trend? how many people were on board? how many survived? how many died?
  2. How the distribution of accidents between military and passengers? any insights?
  3. The highest number of crashes by operator and type of aircraft. The relationship between operators and types of airplanes?
  4. Find the airline routes with most accidents and try to find the reasons.
  5. Find any interesting trends/behaviors that we encounter when we analyze the dataset.

History of airplane accidents

Count of accidents by Year

A1.png

Form the picture, we can see the total accidents trend from low to high before the 1970s. After that, there are some small peaks around 1990 and 2010. But the overall trend after 1990 is gradually going down.

At the beginning of 20 centuries, 1903, Wright brothers invented plane. In 1909, French hold a big flight competition, which threatened the England and other European countries. Even there were many problems with the current planes, the military can’t wait for using it in war. The first time of airplanes’ appearing thus was in Italo-Turkish War. The power of airplane attracted other countries’ military, which leads a huge development in the military aviation industry. From 1914, the first world wartime, airplane mainly used for investigating, transporting, and some peripheral things. At the time of world war II, which is around 1940. Airplanes had widely used in battle. At the same time, World civil aviation organization (IATA) established in Havana, the capital of Cuba in 1945. In 1978, Cater, the president of the USA, signed meaningful a law in the history of American aviation legislation, which is <the airline deregulation act>. The establishment and merger of companies in the US domestic aviation industry, route selection, fare establishment, and even loss-making operations, are basically out of government control and intervention. The number of airplanes grows up fast with the high possibility of air crash occurred. The other reason we consider is that airplane technologies that at that time had weakness and need to improve. With the technologies completed, the amount of air crash will decrease. These situations are obvious after 2000.

Continue reading “Flying in the sky, a report of air crash worldwide” →