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Tag: journalism

Journalists don’t need to do what a bot does

Last August I decided to hire a journalist to produce content for a project. This person would help me with social media posts, newsletters and reports, with the goal of […]

October 26, 2020October 26, 2020 Sérgio Spagnuolo Insights

How Paraguay’s El Surti is adapting to the age of Covid-19, boosting its fact-checking on Whatsapp and launching a new podcast

Four years ago, Paraguayan media outlet El Surtidor — known as El Surti — was created to address deep-seated issues of media accessibility and information inequality in the country. The […]

May 20, 2020May 20, 2020 Maria Silvia Aguirre Behind the scenes, Interviews

Behind the Sports Illustrated COVID-19 Issue

This story originally appeared on Game Plan, a publication exploring the future of sports journalism from Northeastern University’s School of Journalism. When NBA star Rudy Gobert announced he had contracted […]

April 16, 2020May 1, 2020 Kade Krichko Behind the scenes, Interviews

How the Wall Street Journal developed its make-your-own hedcut feature

As of December 2019, the Wall Street Journal has been offering all members the opportunity to create their own portrait “hedcut,” a drawing made of dots and hatched lines. At […]

February 23, 2020April 14, 2020 Evelyn Bleed Behind the scenes, Interviews

The challenging — and delicious — adventures of producing the first America’s Test Kitchen podcast

Kaitlin Keleher, America’s Test Kitchen TV & podcast producer, believes the most powerful stories are the background tales about food: the discoveries, mysteries, history and everything that happened before any […]

February 13, 2020April 14, 2020 Maria Silvia Aguirre Behind the scenes, Insights, Interviews

Reporters often cover traumatic events but discussions of mental health are rare in most newsrooms. That’s changing.

Journalists who are frequently first responders at harrowing scenes of devastation and human suffering are primed to develop post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, depression and anxiety – the “big four” […]

January 22, 2020April 3, 2020 George Barker and Stella Westlake Insights, Longform

Modeling networked media: Diagrams and graphics in John Wihbey’s The Social Fact

The conceptual black-and-white diagram, or idea-oriented infographic, goes back a long time in publishing design and storytelling. Many an academic or explanatory work has some kind of visual tucked away, […]

May 14, 2019May 16, 2019 Aleszu Bajak Insights, Interviews

Six fascinating projects from the 2019 Computation + Journalism Symposium in Miami

How often is social media used as a source in news stories? Can a decision-tree algorithm generate tens-of-thousands of 250-word stories? And what is belief-driven data journalism? Those questions lie […]

February 6, 2019April 10, 2019 Gibby Free Insights, Roundups

The future of machine learning in journalism

Kevin Wall, a visual journalist at The Boston Globe, is just beginning to use machine learning in his reporting. But the large amounts of data he needs to leverage this […]

January 2, 2019April 10, 2019 Floris Wu Longform

How The New York Times used 360 video to show Puerto Rico’s electrical grid repair following Maria

In September 2017, Hurricane Maria devastated the island of Puerto Rico. When the hurricane finally dissipated in early October, the damage had made it the worst natural disaster to hit […]

October 25, 2018November 6, 2018 Maxwell Bauman Behind the scenes, Interviews

Takeaways on being a watchdog reporter from the 2018 Boston Watchdog Workshop

“We found new and fresh ways to look at an issue that many people had covered before, by not only gathering a lot of data that was already out there, […]

October 23, 2018October 24, 2018 Floris Wu Insights

How The New York Times Magazine shipped a soundtrack with its Voyages issue

Through eye-catching photographs of exotic locations, New York Times Magazine’s biannual Voyages issues are meant to transport the audience around the world even if they are just sitting on their sofa […]

October 4, 2018October 4, 2018 Lucas Dean Behind the scenes, Interviews

Talking to Tracy McGrady: How digital tools and a sharp eye helped me set up an interview with my childhood hero

They never said don’t call your heroes. If you’re writing an article about entertainment, athletics or even politics, your professors have probably told you, “In a perfect world, you’d talk […]

June 13, 2018June 13, 2018 Jason Lange Insights

SXSW: ‘Excel is okay’ and other tweet-size insights for data journalists and news nerds

Storybench has boots on the ground covering SXSW from multiple angles, including immersive storytelling, UX design and more. For those that didn’t make it to Austin this year, the next […]

March 17, 2018March 23, 2018 Felippe Rodrigues Roundups, SXSW
nicar 2018 data stories

NICAR: Data stories from last year that you could be doing in your newsroom

The NICAR conference is all about seeing and learning from the best of data journalism. And what better way of understanding success than taking a look at the past. The […]

March 13, 2018March 13, 2018 Felippe Rodrigues Insights, Roundups

Meet the Media Innovation student who builds Boston Globe data stories

Growing up in an “underdeveloped suburb” in China’s Hebei Province, Yan Wu pored over every page of the newspapers that her father took home from work. Wu’s family couldn’t afford […]

February 5, 2018February 5, 2018 Sukee Bennett Interviews, Research

Working with The New York Times API in R

Have you ever come across a resource that you didn't know existed, but once you find it you wonder how you ever got along without it? I had this feeling […]

January 25, 2018January 25, 2018 Jonathan D. Fitzgerald Data Journalism in R

How to merge and clean up multiple CSVs using R

This tutorial solves a problem I was having when working through the exploratory data analysis exercises in Doing Data Science by Cathy O’Neil and Rachel Schutt. I highly recommended picking up a copy for yourself. […]

January 22, 2018March 23, 2018 Martin Frigaard Data Journalism in R, How to

Social media and news: The dilemma of our time

“Our mission is to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together,” says Facebook on its Community Standards page. Founded as a social network, Facebook […]

January 18, 2018January 18, 2018 Huimin Li Insights, Longform

Six things I learned developing an interactive map on the effects of climate change

Every once in a while, newsroom developers and visual journalists get one of those projects that becomes both a big challenge and a great learning experience. That was the case […]

January 12, 2018June 6, 2018 Felippe Rodrigues Climate Journalism Lab, Insights

How The Washington Post offered readers an immersive look at Puerto Rico without power

A blue pickup truck drives past Maria Ortiz Viruet as she walks down a paved road, followed by two small black dogs. The scene’s palm trees and mountains might lead […]

January 2, 2018January 2, 2018 Jenna Ciccotelli Behind the scenes, Interviews

Media Watch: Seung Min Kim on covering Donald Trump

Last month, Politico reporter Seung Min Kim spoke at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism about how the press is and should be covering Donald Trump. Media Watch: Assessing the Press […]

December 28, 2017December 27, 2017 Aleszu Bajak Media Watch, Research

Twitter + R

Introducing twitteR If you've worked with R in any capacity, you've probably noticed by now that developers who create R packages love playing with the letter “R” in their naming […]

November 21, 2017November 21, 2017 Jonathan D. Fitzgerald Data Journalism in R, How to

Welcome to Data Journalism in R

Welcome to Data Journalism in R print(“Hello world”) ## [1] “Hello world” Now that we got that out of the way, welcome to a brand new Storybench vertical, Data Journalism […]

November 21, 2017November 21, 2017 Jonathan D. Fitzgerald Data Journalism in R, How to

How AJ+ reported a mini-documentary series on Syrian immigrants

As Omar Duwaji blew out the signature pink, green, yellow and blue candles on a store-bought birthday cake, he was nearly moved to tears. The cake was a surprise from […]

November 19, 2017November 19, 2017 Paxtyn Merten Behind the scenes, Interviews

Media Watch: Charlie Pierce on covering Donald Trump

Last month, Esquire politics blogger Charlie Pierce spoke at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism about how the press is and should be covering Donald Trump. Media Watch: Assessing the Press […]

November 15, 2017November 15, 2017 Aleszu Bajak Media Watch, Research

Media Watch: Ethan Bronner on covering Donald Trump

Last month, Bloomberg News senior editor Ethan Bronner spoke with students at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism about the job of covering the Trump administration. Media Watch: Assessing the Press […]

November 7, 2017November 7, 2017 Aleszu Bajak Media Watch, Research

Five major takeaways from the 2017 Online News Association conference

What would journalism look like if news outlets optimized for trust? What is the reporter’s role if an organization decides satire is the most effective way of covering politics? What […]

October 11, 2017October 11, 2017 Rowan Walrath Insights, Roundups

How The Boston Globe brought Red Sox pitcher Chris Sale’s unique delivery to life

The Red Sox’s acquisition of pitcher Chris Sale in December has proved fruitful: The lefty ace has had, by almost any measure, the most dominant season by a Sox starting […]

September 28, 2017September 28, 2017 Dylan McGuinness Behind the scenes, Interviews

5 digital practices every local TV station should be thinking about

All local television newsrooms, sooner or later, will have to accept the challenge to go digital. Some stations, though, are seeing the transition more as an opportunity than a burden […]

August 29, 2017August 29, 2017 Felippe Rodrigues Insights, Reinventing Local TV News

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What is Storybench?
Storybench takes an “under the hood” look at the latest in digital storytelling, from data visualization and investigative journalism to virtual reality and the digital humanities. In addition to in-depth features and interviews with industry practitioners, we offer hands-on tutorials that can be “downloaded” right into the newsroom or classroom.

We also publish research we're running at Northeastern's School of Journalism along with collaborators in data science, communication studies, computational social sciences and information design. These projects include the Co-Laboratory for Data Impact, the Climate Journalism Lab, the 2020 Storybench Election Coverage Tracker and the Reinventing Local TV News project.

Want to contribute to Storybench? Pitch us or join us for a graduate degree in the Media Innovation program at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism.
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Storybench 2020 Election Coverage Tracker

The Storybench 2020 Election Coverage Tracker intends to keep tabs on the political coverage of the 2020 presidential election by covering media trends and using various data sources to explore media narratives.

Instead of keeping track of who’s ahead in the horse race, we’ll be turning our focus to those covering the horse race – the media outlets themselves and various proxies for public attention. Follow along here.

Best of Storybench

How the Wall Street Journal visualized 500+ conflicts of interest of the Trumps

Women on the 2020 campaign trail are being treated more negatively by the media

Getting started with data visualization in R using ggplot2

Understanding what makes a visualization memorable

Using French wine reviews to understand TF-IDF, a measure of how unique a word is to a document

 

Projects

Over the next two years we’ll be surveying the media’s coverage of the candidates and the issues. Follow along here.

 


The Reinventing Local TV News Project, from Northeastern’s School of Journalism, is analyzing the formats and practices of local news stations, and suggesting new ways of telling stories that can better engage diverse audiences. Read our inaugural post here.

 

The Climate Journalism Lab

The Climate Journalism Lab aims to examine and unpack the trends, tools and techniques employed by reporters and organizations covering climate change.

 

Join us at Northeastern!

Want to write for Storybench and probe the frontiers of media innovation? Apply for one of our graduate programs at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism.

Rolling admissions, no GREs required and financial aid available. Email here.

Interviews

Pizza, Press & Politics is our weekly speaker series at Northeastern’s School of Journalism. Watch interviews with David Filipov, Mike Workman, Jenn Smith, Martha Durkee-Neuman, Susan Labandibar, John Ward, Marc Fortier, Carol Gregory, Ling-Mei Wong and Elana Gordon.

Collaborative, Open, Mobile

Over the last three years, Storybench has interviewed 72 data journalists, web developers, interactive graphics editors, and project managers from around the world to provide an “under the hood” look at the ingredients and best practices that go into today’s most compelling digital storytelling projects.

They boil down to three key areas of emphasis: 1) highly networked, team-based collaboration; 2) an ethos of open-source sharing, both within and between newsrooms; 3) and mobile-driven story presentation. Read our paper here.

Storybench on Twitter
What is Storybench?
Storybench takes an “under the hood” look at the latest in digital storytelling, from data visualization and investigative journalism to virtual reality and the digital humanities. In addition to in-depth features and interviews with industry practitioners, we offer hands-on tutorials that can be “downloaded” right into the newsroom or classroom.

We also publish research we're running at Northeastern's School of Journalism along with collaborators in data science, communication studies, computational social sciences and information design. These projects include the Co-Laboratory for Data Impact, the Climate Journalism Lab, the 2020 Storybench Election Coverage Tracker and the Reinventing Local TV News project.

Want to contribute to Storybench? Pitch us or join us for a graduate degree in the Media Innovation program at Northeastern University’s School of Journalism.

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