New York City: Who Cares About Google Glass?

Despite controversies with Google Glass and other augmented reality products, New York City is embracing and showcasing the technology as part of its daily life. In the past few months, visionary applications have been launched to cater to both the local and tourist market, providing a futuristic dimension to this great city.

New York City’s Time Travelling Glass Elevator

Following the reopening of The World Trade Centre last November, on May 29 this year the observatory on Level 102 opened. Key to the journey to the deck is a 47-second elevator which, as it rises takes passengers on a virtual tour of the development of New York City. This augmented reality presents like a time travelling glass elevator till it arrives on the 102nd floor.

One World Trade Centre, 2014, source: Wikimedia Commons

Interactive Art Trumps Graffiti

The MetroCard is a familiar and daily fixture in the lives of New Yorkers. With the mundane of the everyday subway commute, a clever app has been launched this year, Metro AR-T turning them into interactive pieces of art when hovered over an IPhone. The project was a collaboration between New York based artists and app developers.

This simple MetroCard turns into a digital art gallery, source: Wikimedia Commons

The Subway’s Tunnel Vision 

An app to capture the daily activity of the subway has been developed by a New York student, Bill Lindmeier. Named Tunnel Vision, it creates animated and interactive map visualisations based on New York’s subway system.

New York City subway comes to life source: Wikimedia Commons

Tunnel Vision was developed based on the existing analog map, overlaid with data accessed from NYC Open Data, and enables users to see which stations are likely to be the most crowded as well as where in the system their train is, simply by pointing their iPhone at a subway map, amidst other features. 

Despite the hostility of the adoption of augmented technology associated with Google Glass, NYC has embraced it, and found unique ways to enhance and improve the lives of its residents and visitors.

Words by Katrina Savell

Does Newscorp Get Data Visualisation Tools?

Media convergence has created an insatiable demand for content from all walks of life. Data visualisation presents an opportunity for journalists to stand out amidst the plethora of information, however, they need to be equipped with the right programming tools to explore and create professional and interactive content. These skills have been likened by Gershen and Page to those required by movie directors – requiring a fusion of storytelling and science.

Movie Direction Likened To Data Visualisation, source: Wikimedia Commons

Media Mogul and NYC’s Best Journalism Schools Collaborate 

NYC Media Lab reports a recent collaboration between Newscorp, The Brown Institute for Media Innovation at Columbia University and NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering.

They advise that technical tools of journalism are frequently developed by people outside the field, and that this collaboration is aiming to make a domain-specific language for journalism, so that ultimately data and code could become routine parts of how journalists find and tell stories.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Newscorp’s VP of Product, Kareem Amin advises “This project is about expanding the toolset for data driven and interactive journalism. It will not only allow non-technical journalists to access, manipulate, visualize and publish data but it will allow also allow them to publish their methodology alongside, which is increasingly important to guarantee transparency and accuracy”.

So in answer to the headlined question – yes, Newscorp gets data visualisation, and being such a powerful player in the global market, this is a great contribution. Independent journalism forms an integral part of our society, and this project is investing in supporting students and professionals to have the tools for data-driven journalism, including data visualisation for the future. 

Simple Data Visualisation from Newscorp’s Wall Street Journal, source: Wikimedia Commons

 Words by Katrina Savell
 

Vocativ: Reporting From The Deep Web Of Data Journalism

Did you know that more than 80% of the Internet sits beyond the functionality and reach of Google and other search engines? This area is called the deep web, and is a vast and incredible source of data for journalists, including access to public forums, databases, social platforms and commerce sites.

The Deep Web, A Vast Playground for Data Journalism, source: Wikimedia Commons

In the emerging and growing area of data journalism there are a few dedicated data-blogs with media giants such as The Guardian and The New York Times’ Upshot as well as ESPN’s FiveThirtyEight. Yet these data blogs are relying mainly on data-savvy reporters.

A New Approach To Storytelling

In 2013 in New York City, a new media and technology venture was launched, Vocativ, aimed at millenials, which explores the deep web to uncover data not easily accessed to the public. They do this through their proprietary technology, Verne, (a data mining software which is usually used by governments and corporations) – which allows them to deliver breaking news stories through the gathering of data as well as discover stories that may not be told.

Vocativ advises this technology allows them to have a place where science meets storytelling and encourages their young and diverse audience to share and engage with their content. In house, Vocativ has a dedicated team of journalists, producers, data analysts, engineers, designers, and developers.

Vocativ World’s First

Vocativ is getting incredible web traffic and high profile validation. In January 2015, Vocativ was the first news organisation to discover, verify, and publish the video of the Paris grocery store gunman pledging allegiance to ISIS after the Charlie Hebdo attack. On a lighter note, Vocativ also produces data-based stories on topics such as the Grammy Awards, the Academy Awards, and US presidential speeches. 

In terms of the emerging trend of data journalism as a new discipline, Vocativ has an interesting news model, yielding superior results. Given much news today is plagued by homogeneity and commoditisation, it has set itself apart from others in the industry.

During Charlie Hebdo Attack, source: Wikimedia Commons 

Words by Katrina Savell 

New York City: Ranks #7 as World’s Most Networked Society

New York City is known as the media capital of the world, yet in Ericsson’s 2014 Networked Society City Index, it ranked 7th behind Stockholm, London and Paris who took out the top spots in that order. So what’s missing in The Big Apple?

New York: A Large City Network, source: Wikimedia Commons

Cities are probably one of the best examples of a complex networked society, with the infrastructural overlaps between social, technical and media networks. The Networked Society Index ranks cities globally based on criteria designed to identify the world’s largest, most interconnected and influential hubs that serve as vehicles for further growth.

As the largest city in the USA, NYC is highly integrated into the global economy, with headquarters to 26 of the world’s Fortune Global 500 companies, and is also a significant contributor to the provision of a wide array of accessible data that can be used in app development or for research purposes. 

Part of The City Network At Times Square, source: Wikimedia Commons

The Big Apple Needs More Bites 

Surprisingly, a relatively low proportion of residents use the full potential of the city’s networked technologies. A number of projects are being implemented to increase the connectivity of New Yorkers. AT&T has, for example, developed a number of solar-powered street charging stations for smartphones.

Another unexpected finding was the availability and quality of the mobile network. This is being addressed with significant expansion of broadband coverage.

Start-Ups Fall Short

NYC ranked high on education and knowledge-intensive centres, yet fell short on patent applications and business start-ups. As we saw in a recent blog post, NYC Council has introduced a number of incentives to the business sector to drive technology investment.

Whilst New York City did rank high on the list, there are challenges to overcome in order to improve its ranking. Multiple initiatives are now in place to address these shortcomings, so it will be interesting to see how the city ranks in this years report.

 Words by Katrina Savell

Buzzfeed: Let’s POUND Audience Fragmentation

BuzzFeed once again asserts its leadership in the news industry by announcing an in house solution to tackle the questions on everyone’s lips – who is our audience? Audience fragmentation now defines the highly complex media landscape, as users are now both senders and receivers of content.

Looks like Buzzfeed agrees, and is acting on academic journalists views that audience moves across digital media with a high rate of overlapping across outlets, rather than showing any loyalty to one news or content brand.

Who Is Our Audience? Source: Wikimedia Commons

At its NewFront event on April 27 this year, Buzzfeed announced it will be introducing a new analytics tool ‘POUND” (Process for Optimizing and Understanding Network Diffusion) which will be able to track cross – platform sharing by its users. 

This seems a good investment for Buzzfeed who are renowned for their business being developed on articles that get widely shared across various social channels. They will now have a better measure of the relationship of those shares, providing deeper insights into audience behaviour.

To illustrate, as opposed to only seeing that a story received a certain amount of tweets, Facebook shares and Pinterest pins, the tool can show that, hypothetically, a tweet directly led to 50 Facebook shares, 30 Retweets and 22 Pinterest pins.

Buzzfeed claims this behaviour tracking is anonymous and provides detailed insights into the type of content being shared, which is beneficial for the editorial team as well as advertisers.

Overall, a great analytical tool for this media giant to gain insight into the fragmented audience landscape.

BuzzFeed Analytics Team at Work, source: Buzzfeed

Words by Katrina Savell

Follow The Leaders: Mozilla, New York Times And Washington Post Collaborate

Without a doubt, the greatest news to hit the media world in 2014 was the leaking of The New York Times Innovation Report to Buzzfeed. A ninety seven page “tell all” document outlining the challenges the might news institution was having trying to effectively incorporate digital and its associated journalistic work practices into its existing news business model. A year on, and the ripple effect is still being felt..

The report was chock full of insights, research and key findings – one of which was the lack of direct interaction The New York Times was having with its digital audience compared to other online newspapers, due to the shortcomings of its news platform. The opportunity to incorporate user generated content and comments would align the paper with industry counterparts such as CNN iReport and AlJazeera.

The New York Times Newsroom Planning For An Innovative Platform 

source: Wikimedia Commons

Community Creation From Collaboration

In June last year, Mozilla was appointed to partner with The New York Times to create a new community platform collaboration in conjunction with The Washington Post. The project brings together world-class journalists, developers, product strategy experts, hackers and designers to create a platform that will deliver community engagement like no other. The project was awarded a $3.89 million grant by the The Knight Foundation and is already in progress.

source: Wikimedia Commons

The objective of the project is to go beyond having a ‘free for all’ comments section for user generated content to a more sophisticated news platform which allows contributors to provide ongoing thoughts and allows them to build up their digital credibility.

A significant investment, yet once the platform is up and running, both The New York Times and The Washington Post will be positioned to become market leaders in engagement with their audience.

Words by Katrina Savell

New York Street Wi-Fi: Free, Fast and a World’s First

Did you know that a team of scientists at Australia’s CSIRO are credited for the patented technology for the invention of Wi-Fi? That’s right, the simple concept allowing computers, smartphones, or other devices to connect to the Internet wirelessly was invented by Aussies.

Years on, and the world continues to benefit from the freedom of cable free Internet access. And this year, New York City plans to take the concept to a whole new level.

LinkNYC Connection Point, source: LinkNYC Media Kit

Farewell Payphone – Hello LinkNYC

Have you ever turned up to a foreign city, and not had the right currency to make a local phone call? Or maybe your phone needed charging? Wouldn’t it be great if you could Google for directions, while you were waiting for your battery to fill, or make a few local calls to sort out your itinerary all in one place? Welcome to the LinkNYC booth.

It is planned by the end of 2015, that a LinkNYC will be on every street corner across New York City (10,000 units), replacing the pay phone and offering an abundance of services to locals and visitors. Each booth will encapsulate an iconic design that houses state-of-the-art wireless technology, interactive systems and digital advertising displays.

For example, phone calls to anywhere in the United States are free, as well as 24/7 free Internet access – which is reported to be 100 times faster than an average street Wi-Fi. An encrypted network connection has been developed between the user and the hotspot, to ensure LinkNYC is safe and secure.

10,000 LinkNYC Connection Points Across New York City, source: LinkNYC Media Kit

The Streets Of New York City, source: Wikimedia Commons

LinkNYC incorporates and showcases so many elements that have evolved around the Internet – Wi-Fi, interactivity, increased speed and memory, connectivity and access. It will be interesting to see what NYC’s plans are for capitalising on new technologies with the Internet in the future. For now, LinkNYC is just another reason to visit or live in this amazing city.

Words by Katrina Savell

HuffPost: Journalism’s Knight in Shining Armour?

Is professional journalism dead? A controversial question which continues to generate significant debate due to the rise of citizen journalists and savvy bloggers in a converged media environment.

This has placed media companies in a state of constant invention to try to keep ahead, as the traditional news model is obsolete. The Chinese wall is gone. The days of keeping journalism and business separate are over. This, however, provides opportunities for journalists to create and run their own news models. 

Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism, source: Wikimedia Commons

Entrepreneurial Journalism Defined

The Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism in New York City describes entrepreneurial journalism as ‘a field of media where journalism is the underlying discipline upon which to create content-based businesses and services that can make money, rather than the popular view of journalism as a type of objective professional public service to be provided to the citizenry of the world.’

Many would agree the greatest challenge for journalists in this new era is the idea of managing their journalism ethical codes, if they take responsibility for both sides of the business. The Tow-Knight Center now offers world leading university programs for students on how to create their own news models and adhere to convention.

Arianna Huffington, Founder of The Huffington Post presents in Madrid

source: Wikimedia Commons

HuffPost Leads The Way 

The Huffington Post, headquartered in NYC is one of the globe’s greatest examples of a successful online news business model. Arianna Huffington, former journalist, launched HuffPost Chicago (a news aggregation service) in 2001. It is now considered the most successful online newspaper in the world, and will be launched soon in Australia in partnership with Fairfax Media.

A Morphing Sensation, Not Cessation

Entrepreneurial journalism presents many opportunities to advance the profession by having convention and codes embedded in business decision making as we see in the courses from the Tow Knight Center in NYC as well as the Huffington Post news model.

Words by Katrina Savell

Tech Boom Drives Tech Journalism In The Big Apple

Move over Silicon Valley, Silicon Alley in New York City (NYC) is reported to be leading the tech boom in the United States in 2015. Tyler Perry, Editor at TechCrunch reports latest data reveals explosive growth in the tech and start up sector, with new offices opening every other day across the city. Great news for technology journalists.

 The FlatIron District, source: Wikimedia Commons,

Silicon Alley, Not Valley

Silicon Alley has been branded the tech and startup hub of NYC since 1995, when its name was derived to try and attract potential employment candidates away from Silicon Valley. It was originally centred in the Flatiron District, and is now headquarters to tech and media giants FourSquare, BuzzFeed and AOL.

 

 Checking In – NYC Cafe, source: Wikimedia Commons

Content Galore in NYC 

Startup culture, innovation reporting and product reviews are all key areas covered by technology journalism. This boom in activity drives news content both locally and abroad. Tech job growth has grown 40% since 2008, which now exceeds Silicon Valley for the same period. TechCrunch also reports that New York City Council is offering tax breaks to attract and keep companies headquartered in Manhattan.

Power to the Tech Journalist

Technology journalists in NYC hold significant power in the success or otherwise of many startups as Business Insider Australia reports. The article makes specific reference to the performance of tech startups based on the press coverage they received.

This reinforces the view from Ben Abraham, regarding the role of technology journalism and its specific influence over business, rather than the traditions of journalism and public interest.

Reassuring News for Female Tech Culture

What makes NYC unique is that retail, media, finance and fashion are all native industries – this convergence is seeing an increase in women entering the tech industry over the male dominated Silicon Valley as we see here reported by Steve Blank of Inc.com‘s article Why More Women Run Companies in New York Than in Silicon Valley.

 New York City Art, source: Wikimedia Commons

Kathy Sierra, who was seriously victimised and harassed as a female technology writer, would be reassured to see the emerging trends engaging women in the technology sphere in New York City.

Words by Katrina Savell