News As User Experience 2015 or Journalism and Data, the New BFFs.

1. News As User Experience
...Or Journalism and Data: The New BFFs
Cindy Royal, Ph.D
Associate Professor
Texas State University
School of Journalism and Mass Communication
croyal@txstate.edu
www.cindyroyal.com
slideshare.net/cindyroyal

2. Digital Media at Texas State

Fundamentals of Digital/Online Media Core Course

Electives

Web Design and Publishing

Coding and Data Skills

Multimedia Journalism

Digital Storytelling

Digital Entrepreneurship

Digital Concentration –
graduate and undergraduate

New Digital Media Innovation Major

SXTXState project

Mass Comm Week brings in digital media speakers from
the region and nation

3. News as User Experience

Social networks and media are having an effect on
traditional media

Increased expectation on part of user as to participation

News examples: comments, ratings, blogs, user-generated
photos and videos; news sites on Facebook, using Twitter,
other social platforms

News sites run the risk of seeming outdated or irrelevant if
you don't give users something to do

Rise of participatory culture –
Henry Jenkins in Convergence Culture

4. News as User Experience

Changing idea of “news”

Breaking news

Mobile – expectation of receiving news anywhere, on
demand

Relationship with community, sources

Relevance of data to storytelling

Rise of tools available to work with and present data

Rise of data journalism as a speciality

Rise of programming skills as an important literacy

5. Examples
New York Times – Rent or Buy

6. Examples
ProPublica Dollars for Docs

7. Examples
New York Times – How Ya’ll, Youse and You Guys Talk

8. Examples
Texas Tribune – Faces of Death Row

9. Examples
Statesman – Child Abuse and Neglect Fatality Database

10. Examples
NYT Fractions of a Second: An Olympic Musical

11. Examples
ProPublica – Money As a Weapons System

12. Examples
Texas State Student Becky Larson – Loud Austin

13. Examples
Stamen Design – MTV Movie Awards Twitter Visualization

14. Resources

Are Journalism Schools Teaching Their Students the Right Skills, - Nieman Lab,
http://www.niemanlab.org/2014/04/cindy-royal-are-journalism-schools-teaching-their-students-
the-right-skills/

When the Data Struts Its Stuff – NYT -
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/business/03stream.html

Teaching with Infographics – NYT - http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/23/teaching-
with-infographics-places-to-start/

Renegades at The New York Times – New York Magazine -
http://nymag.com/news/features/all-new/53344/

Data Journalism at the Guardian: What It Is and How Do We Do It? -
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jul/28/data-journalism

The Programmer Majored in English – Nieman Journalism Lab -
http://www.niemanlab.org/2010/05/the-programmer-majored-in-english-a-fascinating-study-of-
the-nyts-interactive-news-unit/

Poynter – Data-driven Journalism articles http://www.poynter.org/tag/data-driven-journalism/

Stanford – Journalism in the Age of Data - http://datajournalism.stanford.edu/

Hacks/Hackers – hackshackers.com

11 Journalism Jobs You May Hold in the Future - http://sustainablejournalism.org/future-of-
journalism/journalism-jobs-may-hold-future

15. Other Reading

Data Journalism Handbook – European Journalism Centre -
datajournalismhandbook.org

Simon Rogers – Facts are Sacred

Clay Shirky – Here Comes Everybody & Cognitive Surplus

Dan Gillmor – We the Media & Mediactive

Jeff Jarvis – What Would Google Do?

Max McCombs - The Future of News

Douglas Rushkoff - Program or Be Programmed: 10
Commandments for a Digital Age

Henry Jenkins - Convergence Culture

Ian Bogost – Newsgames: Journalism at Play

James Surowiecki – The Wisdom of Crowds