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We have Matt Daniels on the show again (after more than 3 years!). Matt is the CEO of The Pudding, a collective of journalist-engineers that create visual essays that explain ideas debated in culture. Their pieces are incredibly engaging, somewhat witty and always stunning from the visual point of view.
Since our first interview with Matt, The Pudding has been hugely successful with visual essays being very popular and highly debated at the same time. The Pudding has also a very interesting business structure being partially financed by its readers and accepting submissions for visual pieces developed by freelancers.
On the show we talk about what the Pudding is and how it operated. We also comment on some of the most popular pieces. And finally Matt provides more details on how you can get involved with the Pudding and work with them if you want.
[Our podcast is fully listener-supported. That’s why you don’t have to listen to ads! Please consider becoming a supporter on Patreon or sending us a one-time donation through Paypal. And thank you!]
We have Evan Peck on the show to talk about the research he and his students recently published on “Data Is Personal”. The study consists of 42 interviews made in rural Pennsylvania to see how people from different educational backgrounds ranked a set of various data visualizations.
The study raises a lot of questions about how people perceive data visualization, our assumptions about who our readers are and how they use our work. Among many findings a recurring patters is that people read visualizations looking for something they can personally relate to.
With Evan we talk about how the project started, on what are the main findings, and what are the implications for data visualization design.
[This podcast is fully supported by our listeners. If you enjoy listening to Data Stories, consider supporting us on Patreon!]
We have Lisa C. Rost and Gregor Aisch on the show to talk about the exciting work they are doing at Datawrapper. Lisa and Gregor have recently joined the company in Berlin, coming from various experiences in data journalism in the US.
Lisa is known for her long, thoughtful and beautiful blog posts and visualization guides. Gregor is a former graphics editor at the New York Times and has also developed many useful visualization libraries and tools.
On the show we talk about Lisa and Gregor’s transitions from the world of journalism to a software company, the market for data visualization products, and what we can expect from Datawrapper in the future.
In this episode, we have Alberto Cairo from the University of Miami on the show to talk about his newly announced lecture series on “Trumpery” and uncertainty.
Visualization and statistics promise to help people think and behave more rationally, but as we all know there is much more to fulfilling this promise than just showing “the right” graph.
With Alberto we touch upon many topics including partisanship and rhetoric, visualizing uncertainty and risk, and cognitive biases.
There is of course always much more to say on these topics, but this is a good start!
Enjoy the show.
Data Stories is brought to you by Qlik. Are you missing out on meaningful relationships hidden in your data? Unlock the whole story with Qlik Sense through personalized visualizations and dynamic dashboards which you can download for free at qlik.de/datastories.
ProPublica – Jeff Larson http://www.propublica.org
On the show this week we have Jeff Larson, Data Editor at ProPublica, to talk about his team’s recent work on “Machine Bias“. Jeff and his colleagues have analyzed the automated scoring decisions made by COMPAS, one of the systems American judges use to assess the likelihood that a convicted criminal will re-offend.
By looking at the COMPAS data, Jeff and his colleagues sought to determine the accuracy of the algorithm and whether it introduces significant biases into the criminal justice system — racial or otherwise. (Their finding: Yes, it seems that it does.)
On the show we talk about how the software is used by judges, how the ProPublica analysis was carried out, what the team found, and what can be done to improve the situation.
Jeff also gives us a small preview of other stories his team is working on and how you can go about developing similar projects.
Enjoy the show!
This episode of Data Stories is sponsored by Qlik, which allows you to explore the hidden relationships within your data that lead to meaningful insights. Take a look at their Presidential Election app to analyze the TV network coverage for every mention of both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. And make sure to try out Qlik Sense for free at: qlik.de/datastories.
We have Matt Daniels on the show, the “journalist engineer” behind Polygraph, a blog featuring beautiful journalistic pieces based on data. If you are not familiar with the site, stop now and take a look.
Matt starts with a simple question — for example, what songs from the ’90s are still popular? — and tries to answer it through data analysis and visualization. The result is always a well-crafted web page and applications, with a mix of data analysis, interactive graphics, and explanations.
This episode of Data Stories is sponsored by CartoDB. CartoDB is an open, powerful, and intuitive platform for discovering and predicting the key facts underlying the massive location data in our world. Whether you are a business, government agency, or simply a lover of revolutionary spatial insight technology, don’t settle for anything less than the best interactive maps around. Learn how CartoDB is shaping the world of location intelligence at cartodb.com/gallery and check out the Location Data Services mentioned in the ad.
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