Congratulations Corey Takahashi: Winner of the Hacks/Hackers scholarship to Poynter
We’re delighted to announce that freelance journalist Corey Takahashi is the winner of the Hacks/Hackers scholarship to Poynter’s workshop on programming for journalists / journalism for programming.
Based in Los Angeles, Corey is planning to apply the digital skills from the Poynter workshop to revisit demographic trends that he wrote about during the 2000 Census through a data-focused lens. As part of his trip, Corey also will create a video reflecting on what he learns at the workshop and lessons from bringing together the cultures of journalism and programming — and we’ll be sure to post that here.
Corey’s career has taken him across the entire media spectrum as he has stayed on the cutting edge of journalism. He started as a founding editor at hiphop magazine Blaze, and later worked for Vibe, Entertainment Weekly, Newsday and New York Public Radio. He then moved from print to broadcast and has been a contributor to NPR, the CBC and the BBC/PRI/WGBH newsmagazine, The World. He’s a fully multimedia journalist who works across all formats.
Thanks to all the applicants for taking the time to write out their pitches. We were excited to see the range of different people who applied — from college students to hacktivists to full-time freelancers — and the range of ideas. More opportunities soon.
Please join us in congratulating Corey!
Tags: Corey Takahashi, journalism education, Poynter, scholarshipIntroducing Hacks/Hackers Los Angeles
We’re proud to announce the addition of a Los Angeles branch to the ever-growing Hacks/Hackers nationwide network.
Thursday, July 8, more than a dozen members of the Los Angeles journogeek scene joined up for the first introductory Hacks/Hackers LA meetup at Redwood Bar and Grill, conveniently located across the street from the LA Times.
Our first meetup was a mingling event for our community members to get to know each other and for us, the organizers, to get a feel for the kinds of ideas and interests floating around the Los Angeles community.
What we talked about
Most of the conversations throughout the night were in small, circulating circles. A few recurring topics:
Data visualization: What works, what’s possible, what has fallen flat in the past.
Multimedia strategies: One man-band strategy vs. the in-house multimedia inspection team.
Journalism education: Yes, it’s a topic that has been discussed over and over again in journogeek circles, but for a good reason: we all agree that it still needs work. A few memorable notes from discussions about journalism education:
- Many students still care too much about the “grade” rather than the value of the experience they gain. This isn’t the fault of the students, but of the general mindset and educational structure upheld by traditional institutions
- How valuable are entrepreneurial journalism classes/programs? Can you truly teach entrepreneurialism in a classroom setting?
And, just for fun: Hidden food gems in the Southland: Korean clambakes and SF/SD-worthy burritos
What the Twitterverse said
Now that we’ve all had the chance to meet and talk, future meetups will be more structured and thematic with speakers, panels, presentations — you name it. We’re open to ideas from everyone.
Keep an eye on this blog for and our freshly-created Facebook page for updates on the place and theme of the next meetup.
Michelle Minkoff, Eric Zassenhaus and Lauren Rabaino are co-organizers of Hacks/Hackers LA.
A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the New York Times “Moment in Time” Project
The latest Hacks/Hackers NYC gathering was all about photojournalism, hosted in the breathtaking Open Plans penthouse (with a wraparound balcony and a fantastic view) on July 27. Jonathan Tepper, co-founder of Demotix, talked about his crowdsourced photo wire based in London, and the team behind The New York Times’ “Moment in Time” discussed their project that mapped 14,000 user-submitted images onto an interactive globe.
Around 70 people attended with a good mix of programmers and content folk. There was a big contingent from Newsweek, which arrived together, and we even had a representative from 10gen, the company which makes MongoDB, the database that was used for the “Moment in Time” project. (He came wearing a MongoDB T-shirt, so was easy to spot)
No tags for this post.Data Viz Stars Wattenberg+Viégas Demo At Boston Meetup
Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg (“fm” as the two data viz specialists are known to call themselves) demoed their newest venture into the journalism space at the Boston chapters first event Meetup on July 20.
In front of a crowd of between 40 and 50 at the Microsoft N.E.R.D Center (Microsoft’s status jumped in our eyes for that name alone), Fernanda and Martin showed Time Flow, a new open source project for displaying large data sets on a time line, targeted at helping investigative journalists sift through information. They’d be working with Matt Carroll of the Boston Globe, and lead organizer of the Boston Hacks/Hackers Meetup.
The Time Flow tool, which the two have been working on over the summer, can create visual timelines from textual data. The software can import a table of data — presidential appointments, political contributions — and show it as a timeline or a calendar. It also displays the data as sortable and filterable lists. And if creates tables and graphs and offers statistical summaries. The two just accepted positions at Google, which is interesting.
Austin Gardner-Smith also demoed Pinyadda, a platform to make it easier to share links. Thanks to Boston Innovations for covering the event so diligently, and ComputerWorld.
No tags for this post.Hacks/Hackers Chicago is Now in Session
Hacks/Hackers goes to the heartland with its new Chicago chapter. This will be spearheaded by Rich Gordon, a Northwestern prof who is one of the original founders of Hacks/Hackers, and Tracy Schmidt of ChicagoNow.
We have high expectations for our Chicago chapter with Tracy’s organizing prowess and Rich’s Northwestern connections.
We’re still looking for organizers for other chapters: Austin? Seattle? DC? Email burt@hackshackers.com if you’re eager.
No tags for this post.Boston Meetup Highlights Data Viz at Microsoft’s NERD Center on July 20
The Boston chapter is having its first speaker Meetup at the Microsoft NERD Center, 1 Memorial Drive, on Tuesday, July 20, organized by Matt Carroll et al. Munchies are sponsored by Microsoft and The Boston Globe/Boston.com.
Interested in learning more about the cutting-edge world of data visualization? Want to know how to turn lifeless data into game-changing charts, maps, and visuals? Martin Wattenberg and Fernanda Viégas, world-recognized leaders in data visualization, will be the main speakers. Their pioneering work has reinvented visualization as a mass medium. They will present new tools for helping reporters create timelines.
The two led IBM’s Visual Communication Lab and their landmark system, Many-Eyes.com, was the first to put powerful visualization tools in the hands of a general audience. Their vision of democratizing visualization has empowered journalists, businesspeople, and scientists to tell stories with data.
Also speaking: Austin Gardner-Smith will talk about Pinyadda.com, a web application designed to make it easy to gather, customize, and share news and information from across the web
The meeting starts at 6 p.m., with munchies until 7, when talks start.
No tags for this post.Win a Scholarship to a Poynter Journalism Programming Seminar
Hacks/Hackers and The Poynter Institute are offering one full scholarship (a $795 value!) to attend the institute’s three-day seminar in St. Petersburg, Florida: Programming for Journalists / Journalism for Programmers (More info at http://hckhc.kr/doUlhi). The seminar takes place from August 25-27, 2010. Faculty includes Hacks/Hackers co-founder Aron Pilhofer of The New York Times; Matt Waite, who designed the Pulitzer Prize-winning Politifact at the St. Petersburg Times; and other industry leaders. It’s designed to help hacks and hackers better understand each other ‘s thinking through hands-on training.
To be clear, the scholarship is just for the tuition. You are still responsible for travel to/from St. Pete. But it’s near Tampa, which generally has well priced flights (especially in August!)
To apply for the scholarship, we’re making this super easy. Please write a pitch of up to 500 words on what you’d like to do/report on/hack together based on what you’ll learn at the seminar. The deadline is July 24. We might have follow -up questions. We’ll notify everyone by the end of July.
If you have any other questions, please email scholarships@hackshackers.com.
Of course you can always directly apply too.
No tags for this post.NYC Meetup at Meetup Recap: Games, Ads, APIs and Scott Heiferman
Thanks to the 80-some of you who came to the Hacks and Hackers NYC meetup July 14. We’ve received a lot of positive feedback about the event. We’d love to hear your ideas for future talks about the intersection of journalism and technology. Leave a comment or email us at nyc[at]hackshackers[dot]com.
So on to it.
Nick Diakopoulos, a post-doc research associate at Rutgers University, talked about his work on turning data into information graphics games. One example is Salubrious Nation, which challenges players to guess the public health of a communities nationwide based on county demographics.
Another is Vox Civitas, which analyzed Twitter messages posted during President Obama’s State of the Union address. Graphing keywords on a chart showing time and message volume and adding a tweet window revealed interesting patterns. For instance, Nick and his colleagues noticed a spike about 28 minutes into the president’s speech. Turns out air force bases issued a burst of tweets as he spoke about funding for military family support. Search on the keyword “military” to see for yourself.
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