The evolution of data journalism – David Ottewell – Medium

I’m writing a piece about the evolution of the Trinity Mirror data unit over the last five years, and as a result have been pulling together some of our front-page stories since last January.

These stories come from a range of sources. Some are from the data unit drilling down into routinely published datasets to local levels; the bread-and-butter of our work. Some are from FOI requests; some are from scrapes; some are good old-fashioned ideas-based investigations: “I wonder if…”

What they all have in common is that they are all stories that were written by the data unit (or co-written with colleagues on the individual Trinity Mirror titles), and they are stories that would not have been told without us.

It seems odd putting such stall in front pages when we are a digital-first unit, but there isa point to it. Data journalism isn’t a exotic novelty any more, and shouldn’t expect to be treated as one. Data journalism needs to be constantly breaking great stories, stories that wouldn’t be told without it. It needs to work to the same rhythms as the rest of journalism. It needs to embrace the same pressures: editorial pressures, commercial pressures, engagement pressures.

Data journalists need to judge themselves like every other journalist. How many stories am I breaking? How good are they? How many people are reading them and engaging with them? Is data journalism allowing me to tell stories and share information in betterways, and — crucially — do I have the audience metrics to support this claim?

Innovation is getting data journalism on a front-page. Delivery is getting it on the front page day after day. Innovation is building a snazzy interactive that allows readers to explore and understand an important issue. Delivery is doing that, and getting large numbers of people to actually use it; then building another one the next day, and another the day after that.

The pace of change is such that years in journalism are like dog years: one year for us feels like five, ten, 15 for other industries.

Data journalism doesn’t feel young any more. Data journalism merely existing isn’t an innovation any more. We need to talk about delivery — and the kind of delivery the industry, and our readers, actually want.