Yesterday I went on a major learning/exploration binge online. Thanks to my community here on E-Media Tidbits, as well as Contentious, Twitter, and the members-only discussion list of the Society of Environmental Journalists, I learned a ton about the journalistic and news uses of interactive maps.
Of all the maps with news or journalistic value that were recommended to me yesterday, these made the greatest impression:
Elephant Wars, a multimedia-laden Google Earth map (kmz file) from National Geographic. Great example of how to connect an interactive map with several kinds of storytelling. Includes automated tours to guide you through the data to tell different stories, and timeline animations. It all connects back to a series of National Geographic articles. (Thanks to Poynter’s Ellyn Angelotti for the tip.)
Bakersfield.com Maps This news org site has gotten pretty creative with using fairly simple Google maps to connect with the community. My favorites: Bakersfield Quirks, Bakersfield’s Future Highways, and Pete Tittl’s Restaurant Picks (Thanks to the Bakersfield Californian’s Matylda Czarnecka for the tip.)
TribTowns, from the Salt Lake Tribune. Josh Awtry explained what they’re doing: “This experiment is going quite well. It’s an effort to geolocate all news, sports and entertainment that isn’t broad or issue-based on a map of our coverage area. In a perfect world, it would replace our microzoned print editions. Until we get perfect buy-in, it isn’t ready for the big leagues, but the experience in the newsroom has gone quite well so far.”
Katrina maps, from the New Orleans Times Picayune. Mark Scheifstein, longtime environmental reporter for that paper, told me about these: “We published an interactive graphic accompanying our March 2007 series ‘Last Chance’ about coastal erosion. Also, a year after Katrina, we published an interactive map showing how the rebuilding effort was going. At that same time, we published another interactive map showing how the city actually flooded during Katrina.”
…I have plenty more examples, and I’ll be writing about several of them. Rest assured, I went “Wow!” over almost every news map I encountered. There’s so much more I should be covering in this field. Stay tuned.
Minor criticism: I’d love to see mobile and widget (site and desktop) versions wherever possible for news maps. I’m seeing very little of that so far from news orgs. Remember: Online media is definitely not just about your Web site anymore.
I’ve been delving heavily into interactive maps lately because this morning I was interviewed for the Directions on the News podcast about news maps. (I’ll post a link to that show when it’s available next week.) Editor Adena Schutzberg told me that the geospatial community and researchers who create cool maps are eager to learn how to better connect with journalists and communities through the maps they create. What kinds of research-related maps would help you do better journalism? Please comment below.
