By
Noko Pela and Odwa Mkentane
This is the world according to Anina Mumm, the
coordinater Data Clinic - an African Media Initiative, at the Highway Africa conference.
Mumm, together with University of
Witwatersrand Journalism lecturer Dinesh Balliah conducted a rather successful
workshop which aimed at equipping journalists with the right techniques of data
processing.
The pair believes that processing data
ultimately results in information for the reader. The data was presented and
interpreted using the spreadsheet Microsoft Excel 2010.
The workshop focused on calculating data,
sorting it according to its different categories, filtering, and how to
transform the data into different shapes and graphs mouths.
According to Dinesh Balliah, the
significance and purpose of this workshop is to introduce data journalism to
journalists and she believes that using excel will be a basic start to data
journalism.
She further adds that data journalism
involves manipulating, interrogating and asking about information data sets.
Tshegofatso Bafana, second year Media
studies and Communication management at Tshwane University of Technology
student says, “Data Clinic was an insightful, informative and cultivating
workshop.
“I didn’t know that numbers are important
in journalism; I always thought that it’s something for BCom students. Anina
and Dinesh have given me a new prospective on journalism, and that is data
journalism,” she said.
Balliah says that data journalism is used
in most cases when a politician makes claims prior to the elections that they
have increased jobs or decreased the crime rate.
In
these cases journalist are able to challenge or check the information before
incorrect information is published.
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