Great advice on seeing news content as data

Most news stories are basically data in paragraph form.

Each of the 5 W’s could just as easily be a field in a database. Structured as data, not simply as stories, “who” becomes more than a fact for a story; it relates this story to the other stories with the same “who.”Databases give news content more lasting value, by providing context and relationships.

I don’t have a lot more to say about this right now. I just mention it because Michelle Minkoff makes similar points in a post about some data projects she worked on for the Los Angeles Times: We must understand our news content as data.

I won’t elaborate, beyond encouraging you to read her post. It reminded me of a post by Dan Conover: The “Lack of a Vision” thing? Well, here’s a hopeful vision for you.

For a further understanding of the value of data for journalism, I also recommend:

Rivers of Data by Derek Willis (also linked and recommended by Minkoff).

Be the Answer, my 2008 report on interactive databases for the American Press Institute‘s Newspaper Next project.

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