Guardian seeks public’s help in expenses probe
Guardian.co.uk is calling on its readers to use its research tools to search through some 700,000 MP expenses documents to see if there are more instances where a claim needs investigation.
It is asking people to read through the documents and when they see a possible irregularity hit the ‘investigate this’ button and the Guardian will take a closer look.
There are so many documents to review that the Guardian’s crowdsourcing move makes sense – and what a great story to use it on.
Looking forward to seeing how this project develops! And to the future twists, turns and revelations in the expenses story.
If you want to help the Guardian with its research click here
RTE.ie on Campaign Daily
I got the chance today to go on RTE One’s live election show Campaign Daily to talk about the election website with Bryan Dobson. Check it out on the RTE Player here (for people outside of Ireland try here) it’s around the 45 minute mark.
Don’t forget to check out RTE.ie’s election Twitter feed
Something I’ve been working on…RTÉ.ie/elections
RTÉ Elections 2009
In the last few weeks quite a bit of my time has been spent coordinating the website for the 5 June elections. It was launched this week and you can visit it here.
Check out the group blog Campaign Daily – with great contributions this week from Mark Little (who had an excellent blog on RTÉ.ie for the US elections), Miriam O’Callaghan and Cian McCormack.
Visit us at Twitter @RTE_Elections and while you’re there follow Prime Time’s new Twitter stream @RTE_PrimeTime as well.
There’s lots of great material on the main site including an excellent guide to PR-STV by UCD’s Prof Richard Sinnott (the system of voting used in Ireland), chapters from the just published and widely discussed All Politics is Local, lots of great audio and video highlights from RTÉ’s best news and current affairs programmes and features written by young journalists covering the European Parliament elections.
It’ll be a busy couple of weeks ahead as the website keeps on growing and the elections get closer but I’m looking forward to it particularly the count weekend!
Blathnaid
P.S By the way send us in your election photos!
Guardian launches Open Platform
The Guardian has launched a new commercial venture, which will enable ‘partners’ to reuse guardian.co.uk content for free while carrying its advertising.
Guardian News & Media Director of Digital Content Emily Bell says the move will help to weave its content into the ‘fabric of the web’.
The Guardian’s Kevin Anderson writes:
A content application programming interface (API) will smooth the way for web developers to build applications and services using Guardian content, while a Data Store will contain datasets curated by Guardian editors and open for others to use.
More from the Guardian about Open Platform here.
What others are saying:
Wired says this is not a new move citing that it comes ‘on the heals of a similar move by the New York Times and seems to point toward a new kind of approach to online news — give away your content and send the advertising with it.’
Tom Watson calls it ‘revolutionary’ and ‘leap into the future’.
My initial thoughts:
It will further consolidate content.
Open Platform like the NYT’s Developer Network could push the wires into doing something similar.
The data store element of this initiative is very interesting and is worth keeping an eye on.
ITV to cut 1,000 jobs
The broadcaster has announced it is to cut some 1,000 jobs, 40% of its regional staff will be let go in the move.
Read about the fallout, which followed the announcement here
Foreign Policy bought by Washington Post Co
According to paidContent.org Foreign Policy magazine, which comes out every two months and its website have been bought by the Washington Post Company
Read more about the acquisition here
Covering the Democratic convention
I am in Washington DC at the moment en route from Dublin to Denver. I have done a little work here, but mostly preparation for the week ahead in Denver.
Keep an eye out for coverage from the Democratic and Republican Party conventions from Monday on RTE.ie/news.
Looking forward to a challenging week!
Jump in belfasttelegraph.co.uk readership
From the Newspaper Society
The INM newspaper launched its redesigned website a month ago and it has seen a 29% jump week on week in page impressions – pretty impressive!
It’s a nice site, a huge improvement on the old one and much more user friendly. It does follow the INM formula pretty much to the letter though.
