diGJamaica: The Gleaner Makes Information Accessible

diGJamaica.com The Gleaner Makes Information Accessible

Deika Morrison @deikamorrison Director, Gleaner Online

© The Gleaner Co. Ltd.

Agenda

1. What is diGJamaica.com

2. Making Information Accessible

3. Using Data Journalism To Enhance Understanding

4. How to use diG and connect with diG


What is diGJamaica.com

diGJamaica stands for digital information (from) The Gleaner. Inspired by the Handbook of Jamaica, it is an online collection of information you need to know about Jamaica, taken from the most trusted sources, including The Gleaner’s 179-year-old archive and government documents. It’s your Jamaican digital resource for the “stuff behind the news”.


What is diGJamaica.com Front Page Screenshot


Making Information Accessible The Philosophy

ac-ces-si-ble: adjective

1. obtainable

2. easy to use

3. readily understandable


We wanted people to be able to get their hands on information they needed. That drove decisions about:

Making Information Accessible Obtainable

Everything ‘you’ need to know, where ‘you’ is everybody – citizens, foreigners, students, businesspeople, Government, Diaspora, journalists

Emphasis on practical and relevant.

Broadest possible access.

1) what kind of information/content

2) how the information is to be made available


Making Information Accessible Obtainable

Online 24/7

Searchable

Visual Interactive

21st Century Handbook of Jamaica


We believe that if information is easy to use, then people will use it. That drove decisions about how to convey content using different formats and technology

Making Information Accessible Easy To Use and Readily Understandable

We also believe that making information truly accessible means helping people to understand that information.



Examples: Some Of The Features

Text Text Text Text Text Text Text Text Text Text Text

Images - New Photos, Old Photos and Historical Front Pages that stand alone, are integrated with text, presented in Slideshows, Timelines.


This Day In Our Past

Front pages from the past with interesting

news items from various years on a

given day




Trivia Game Make Jamaican facts fun




Government documents in

flip magazine

format with search, zoom

etc.




Directories with non-traditional

information with drop down boxes




Filterable comprehensive

calendar.

Search by type, parish, name or

date.

Add your own events.




Dashboard of Indicators

Click on each tab for a drop down page of colour coded – red

(worse), green (better).

Click through each indicator to static and

motion charts




Charts Static and Motion


Examples: Some of the Features


Making Information Accessible Using Data Journalism To Enhance Understanding

We created a site that presented data and information in many different ways that made it ‘accessible’ – i.e. “obtainable”, “easy to use” and “readily understandable”.

But we wanted to enhance understanding, and so we evolved into data journalism…



According to the BBC: “Broadly the term ‘data journalism’ covers projects that use data to do one or more of the following: •  Enable a reader to discover information that is personally

relevant •  Reveal a story that is remarkable and previously unknown •  Help the reader to better understand a complex issue

These categories may overlap and in an online environment can often benefit from some level of visualization.”



First, instead of

just putting up the data,

we started to

‘diG’ deeper

Cost per yard of road for select JDIP roads (Based on GOJ data)



Next, data and analysis

were used for front

page stories we created

Ja racks up $J12.5m per hour in new debt:

“Put more simply, Jamaica has added debt at the rate of J$299 million per day or J$12.5 million per hour, or J$207,000 per minute or, finally, almost J$3,461 per second.”




“In context, Jamaica added debt at a rate per day that could have paid the annual salaries of 167 new primary and secondary level teachers. The nation added enough debt per hour that could buy three state-of-the-art ventilators and leave change for machine maintenance.”



were used for front




“The Government of Jamaica has agreed to new debt, which, per minute could have almost paid for a University of the West Indies' student's education and finally, new debt has been incurred each second that could alternately have comfortably bought a patty, coco bread and box drink for a dozen homeless persons.”



were used for front





were used for front


Jamaican exports not worth cost of imported fuel: “Trade data unearthed through website www.diGJamaica.com has revealed that the value of all the island's exports from January to August this year would fail to cover the cost of importing petroleum products for the same period.”…


Then, we

started regular

blog posts with

charts


….the dollar climbs….

….the NIR sinks….


Some of our Blog

Headlines


Summary

diGJamaica.com was created to address an articulated need – by the public - to make facts, figures and data more ‘accessible’, i.e. obtainable, easy to use and readily understandable.

Data Journalism was a natural evolution. We use the tools we

created to tell stories to meet our original objective. And we

encourage others to use those tools to tell their stories.


7 Quick Ways To “diG”

1) Use the search bar

2) Click on the blue Dashboard Tabs

3) Click on main menu options. Drop down and explore the sub-menus.

4) Click on one of the sections on the front page

7) Use the ‘sitemap’ in the menu at the bottom of the front page

5) When you are on a page, click links on related information

6) Explore diGJamaica.com/blog which has categories and tags to enable easier search


Connect with diGJamaica.com

We want to hear from you! Is there something you think we should diG up? Do you have information that you'd like to share? Email us at [email protected] or use the ‘suggest diGs’ tab in the yellow section at the top of the page.

RSS FEED Subscribe to the diGJamaica.com/blog’s RSS Feed:

FACEBOOK Connect with us on Facebook: diG Jamaica

TWITTER Connect with us on Twitter: @diGJamaica

NEWSLETTER Subscribe to diGJamaica.com/blog’s daily newsletter

FREE


THANK YOU


News & Politics

diGJamaica: The Gleaner Makes Information Accessible