Archives for posts with tag: everyblock

Just wanted to bring your attention to some news-related projects that launched this week:

ReportingOn logo
Reporters looking for advice from other reporters should take a look at ReportingOn.

Ryan Sholin’s revamped site is like a help forum for news developers and journalists, particularly beat and local journalists. Follow ReportingOn on Twitter. You’ll find me on ReportingOn too.

Everyblock logo
The hyperlocal news and data site Everyblock released its source code, much to the delight of Django developers everywhere.

Everyblock is the brainchild of Adrian Holovaty, one of the co-developers of the Django framework. Read more about the project, poke around and see what you find.

Personally, I’d also like to see the source code for the Everyblock iPhone app, but one thing at a time.

W3C Mobile Web Initiative logo
If you want to learn more about mobile site design, consider signing up for W3C’s first-ever live training session in Cambridge, UK.

The event takes place Oct. 13. Registration — at a hefty €399.00 (about US$558 at today’s exchange rate) — includes lectures and hands-on workshops, as well as access to the nine-part course. Read the full description, register online or read more about the W3C Mobile Web Initiative.

Feel free to browse around the blog. A few of the most popular posts on Ricochet include:

What ideas and tools would you like to know more about? Drop a comment, or ping me on Twitter @MacDivaONA.

picture-1.pngA few weeks ago, database journalist extraordinaire Adrian Holovaty launched the much-anticipated EveryBlock, the geotagged local information website.

While there’ve been complaints that EveryBlock is little more than a tremendous database of photos and impersonal facts, it is a data-rich site full of stories and story possibilities, as Matt Waite points out.

Rex Sorgatz of Fimoculous interviewed Holovaty to learn some of the challenges of building and scaling the site, as well as his plans for data standardization and community features. Of note:

“I guess there’d be some value in standardizing approaches to structured data (like, building a nationwide crime database), but we’re more immediately interested in standardizing the geocoding of ‘blobs.’ The main premise is that locations in news articles should be defined in a machine-readable way. Look for something from us soon.”