Innovation
Tips for using research to make behavioral analytics useful
“What we really want is to be the light that illuminates the newsroom as we move forward on our journalistic and business goals,” James Robinson, director of analytics for The New York Times said on the power of analytics. “If people can’t use that light to see where they’re going, they’re going to get stuck … Continued
RJI, Missouri School of Journalism support launch of News Product Alliance
Seeing news product strategy as a need in newsrooms, but witnessing slower adoption has prompted RJI and the Missouri School of Journalism to get involved in supporting the launch of the News Product Alliance. NPA, which just launched in September, is a global community of news product professionals founded by more than 30 journalists and … Continued
Newly launched app empowers journalists to fight against harassment and assault
A new app, JSafe, built to help female journalists fight against harassment, bullying and assault, launched today in the Apple Store and Google Play Store. The Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute launched the app to help journalists fight against threats against them and find the resources they need when they find themselves in threatening situations. … Continued
Your first web-scraping project will be easier than you think
Last week, a colleague emailed me with a data request. She was working on a story about the shifting sands of Republican congressional rhetoric on climate change and was wondering if GOP voting records had seen any corresponding shifts in recent years. She pointed out that one good measure of environmental voting comes from the … Continued
What’s Working: Newsletters may be reaching their limits, but there’s hope beyond the inbox
Email newsletters are thriving, but their ascendancy in today’s media brings with it a certain foreboding: Given how successful the format has been the past few years — and how many writers have turned to newsletter platforms like Substack to build their personal brands and possibly earn some real money — it feels almost inevitable there … Continued
Discovering how readers perceive photos and video
The main questions bouncing around my educator’s noggin for the last couple of decades have been about how visuals resonate with audiences — what draws a person’s attention, helps them to parse information, to understand and remember? My goal with this RJI project is to create practical materials to help small newsrooms and non-profit organizations … Continued
Make your reporting more diverse: Try a different network, redefine experts
In the survey of 750 journalists, editors and producers conducted by ExpertFile in conjunction with The Associated Press, journalists acknowledged that there remains a significant gap in representing a more diverse set of experts in their coverage. Despite a recognition of the need for more diverse voices in their coverage, the national survey also found … Continued
Looking for a subscription success story? Try Scandinavia’s Schibsted
Scandinavia online readers lead the world in paying for online news, with 26% on average in Nordic countries answering affirmatively to the 2020 Reuters Digital News Report question, “Have you paid for online news content?” In Norway alone, the percentage of readers who pay for online news is 42%, up eight percentage points from 2019. … Continued
Mapping COVID-19 cases in Observable with Vega-Lite
Choropleth maps show how data varies across a geographic region, a visualization technique used often to present a wide variety of data, including economic data, election results and, more recently, the prevalence of COVID-19 cases and deaths. I recently created a choropleth map that pulls live county-level COVID-19 case data from the Missouri Department of … Continued
Salary disparities are the most visible factor of discrimination against Latino journalists
“As a photojournalist for one of the Hispanic TV networks, I realized big differences between the “general market” and the Hispanic market. In one of my jobs the salary was almost 50% less than the same position in English.” This statement was provided by a Latino journalist who answered Fundamedios survey about the main challenges … Continued