Mapping the Syrian Conflict

Thursday, 10 September, 2015

An interesting short piece over at the BBC about mapping the Syrian conflict - what is interesting is the BBCs lack of understanding about how data, (online) mapping and journalism are merging together to create a new generation of (often (remote) citizen) data journalists. The first strap line on the clip is:

“A new generation of cartographers are using social media to map the Syrian conflict”

But actually this misses a large part of the change in reporting - just look at the well regarded data journalism at The Guardian, and the related article explaining data journalism. Simon Rogers (from The Guardian) has written “Facts are Sacred”, whilst you also have The Data Journalism Handbook and Data Journalism. This is a hot ticket at the moment and has come out of the rise in open data revolution through government sites such as data.gov.uk (and, for that matter, the leak of databases such as Edward Snowden through Wikileaks and Ashley Madison for high profile examples).

In addition to the data, we also have (increasingly free) tools to collaboratively explore, analyse and visualise these datasets (see The Guardians list for example) and the increasing profile of data visualisation and infographics (Knowledge is Beautiful for example).

Cartography (and GI Science) clearly has an important role to play in the development of this area in terms of data manipulation, visualisation (particularly online and dynamic) and, in particular, spatial data. But let’s not confuse what is the convergence and development of existing subjects and technologies that service society within the narrow constrictures of the reporting shown here by the BBC.

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