Raquel-Computational Journalism@Público.pptx
Transcription
Raquel-Computational Journalism@Público.pptx
Raquel Albuquerque CIMJ and INESC-ID REACTION Computational Journalism @Público 1. REACTION task 7: Computational Newsroom 2. Journalistic approaches to social media: Twitteuro and Sentibubbles 3. Data exploration, analysis and visualization: four stories step by step 4. The effects of computation in journalism REACTION Presentation REACTION REACTION Task 7 Computational Newsroom Why? Journalistic excellence today requires advanced data mining and exploration in order to present new, original and unique stories • Readers are no longer a mass • Social networks and blogs have emerged • Digitally stored documents and databases are now available • More sophisticated and easy-to-use software and tools have been developed REACTION Computational Newsroom How? Evaluating the developed computational journalism methodology in a production setting, to provide a critical analysis of practical impact on newsroom quality and efficiency Procedure? Production of stories with different natures and levels of investigation, based on data collection and analysis, in two different ways: - with tools developed by REACTION - with free and open source tools available on the Internet REACTION Computational Newsroom Two kinds of results: • Articles dependent on a computational approach to data (ex. Twitteuro or Sentibubbles) • Stories driven by the use and exploration of data (ex. PhDs in Portugal) “What is involved in a computational approach to journalism is how stories can be discovered, presented, aggregated, monetized and archived.” Sarah Cohen, James Hamilton and Fred Turner (2010) REACTION Computational Newsroom REACTION Journalistic approaches to social media TWITTEURO. Collection of tweets to monitor in real-time the popularity and trends of the Euro 2012 teams and players during the matches • Aimed at analysing the sentiment of tweets • Journalistic approach defined in advance: short articles written after each Portuguese match REACTION Journalistic approaches to social media SENTIBUBBLES. Collection of Facebook comments with sentiment analysis and design of a word cloud with the 50 most repeated words. • Word cloud embedded in the article’s page • Journalistic approach: in-depth and enlarged story on the conclusions of the analysis and on the relevance of social media for Portuguese REACTION Journalistic approaches to social media • While other media were covering the total numbers of comments, this was an exclusive story • This case illustrated the difference between data, information and informing knowledge (added-value process by Robert S. Taylor, 1982) • Time was fundamental. Deadlines may block the success of journalistic approaches to social media content REACTION Why did this approach work better? REACTION Data exploration, analysis and visualization Data compilation. Compilation of the first list of PhDs in Portugal since 1917. • Open Refine was used to clean the database • Journalistic approach: analysis of the evolution of PhDs with a multimedia coverage (interactive data visualisation, stories in video and text) REACTION Data exploration, analysis and visualization http://publico.pt/multimedia/infografia/evolucao-dosdoutoramentos Multimedia website with data visualization. Special page with a long-form structure and an interactive visualisation of data on the evolution of wildfires in Portugal • Contents were presented in a dynamic and interactive way • The page was launched in July 2013 and was updated until October 2013 • Database exploration led to an exclusive story REACTION Data exploration, analysis and visualization http://publico.pt/floresta-em-perigo http://publico.pt/floresta-em-perigo/doze-anos-deincendios Investigation. Exploration of data on the political parties funding of local electoral campaigns • Planned seven months in advance (to be published at the beginning of the 2013 local elections) • Data were organised with tools as Tabula, Unpdf, Open Refine and Google Spreadsheets • An interactive visualisation provided the navigation through 2,000 candidates funding information REACTION Data exploration, analysis and visualization Results • There was flexibility to plan an infographics for the printed version of Público • It was an unique, exclusive and original content based on public data • It worked as an evidence of the potential of computation in journalism REACTION Data exploration, analysis and visualization REACTION The effects of computation in journalism There was an evolution at Público. Why? • Awareness and involvement of the newsroom • Approach to stories with a particular attention to the use of data • Acquired skills were useful to improve • Recognition of the value added by these stories • Positive reactions from readers • Acknowledgment of the potential for new stories, unblocking previous obstacles REACTION The effects of computation in journalism But there are obstacles: • The concept and its role in journalism is not completely clear among journalists • There are different ‘levels of technology’ used by journalists in their routines • A solid development of computational journalism in a newsroom depends on the existence of journalists dedicated to it • Time, aims and resources have to be evaluated • An open access to data is still a problem REACTION The effects of computation in journalism