Data sets are lifesavers

Journalism is facing an existential threat. It is a hacked phrase used, reused oft out of context. 
The journalism industry has been facing tough decisions since the days the internet became a repository for information. The tubes of information flow, for so long in the control of gatekeepers were chunked away. In their place, the virtual connections that allowed anyone to be a creator of content without the gatekeepers took hold. 

Journalism has had to figure out how to stay relevant and make a living amidst the never-ending destruction. 
The last year and half have made that task even more ardours. I have spoken with 100’s of journalists spread all over the world from those in quarantine in China, to others reporting in New York to Nepal to Mexico City. Talking to them is part of my work. 

"Journalism as an industry is prone to be hooked onto periodic trends. A while back we were preached on the merits of development journalism, peace reporting and conflict reporting. They have receded to the sidelines"

They have told me tales of anxiety filled with fear for a deadly pandemic. Remote working regimes where some of them, including the writer, were stuck inside their homes for months with loved ones. We did not know how to face up to the challenges. We all learnt as we went. We all made mistakes. 
On top of all this, there was the financial uncertainty. Some were laid off, others, freelancers struggled to find work and then get paid for the work they did. Those who were able to work were under multiple stresses. 

This was a fast moving story unlike anything anyone has even heard of in breadth and reach. A story whose details could mean life and death of the very own communities the journalists were cocooned within. 
There was no escaping the reach of the virus, there were no fly-in, fly-out parachute journalism. That was passé.  
Amidst the doomsday pandemic we were living through, there was something else. It was initially just a whisper. Soon it could not be ignored. The steady hum in the background had become a chorus. 

Faced with mounting avalanches of fakes, conspiracy theories, quack cures (from drinking detergent to the infamous paniya), many frightened citizens now were looking for verified timely information. 
Some of them found to their utter horror that their own governments were playing around with figures in macabre efforts to stage-manage the political fallout of deadly virus.  The demand for authentic information has never been this high or this lifesaving. As media professionals our task is to recognise this. 

Journalism as an industry is prone to be hooked onto periodic trends. A while back we were preached on the merits of development journalism, peace reporting and conflict reporting. They have receded to the sidelines. 
Then came digital journalism and mojo or mobile journalism. With COVID and the situation in countries like India and Myanmar there is re-emphasis on citizen journalism. There is one another particular core theme that I think could be quite useful these days – data journalism. 

"If journalists can pay a bit more attention to the data – like how the infection rate has just sky rocketed in Sri Lanka since April 21 or that the surge that was detected in October last year was never really fully brought under control – many others could benefit from the effort. "

The misconception among many, including some data journalism trainers is that this is all about presenting data. You actually don’t need journalists to do that, statisticians would do that much better. 
Data journalism is more about data crunching, looking for trends and themes. It is also about data visualisation. Letting the data talk on a medium not limited to spreadsheets and charts. 
If journalists can pay a bit more attention to the data – like how the infection rate has just sky rocketed in Sri Lanka since April 21 or that the surge that was detected in October last year was never really fully brought under control – many others could benefit from the effort. 

But you need a bit of brains and heaps of innovation to stand out from the cacophony. One thing that the pandemic has established is that the pivot to online as the mainstay for journalism is now complete. But there is no ‘one size fits all’ solution. 
What has worked in Scandinavia will not work here, not even what has probably worked in regional countries. Each country is its own digital eco-system. The sooner we adapt the more chances we have to keep reporting. 

The writer is a journalism researcher and a writer. He can be contacted on 
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