Interactive Journalism

One of the better things that has come out of the Internet is the interactive factors that come into play for the consumer. These interactive features can be used as tools, entertainment, and file sharing. Certain online news outlets have done a great job of harnessing the capabilities of the web. Many news sources use slide shows, amateur video, charts, time lines, among other things that take on an interactive feature of their own. When the 2010 US Census became public, news outlets needed a clear and efficient way to let readers see where our population is currently. Thanks to the Internet, the New York Times was able to use this interactive chart to tell the story. The best part about this feature is that it lets you see population growth in every county of the United States. Before the internet, newspapers had to pick and choose what information to put into the article or map, deeming what was important and what was not. Now, there is infinite space for the same outlets. Readers can deem which information is important for themselves. There are several different maps to look at. They range from racial breakdown to housing vacancy. Whatever information anyone would want to know in regards to the census is available in a couple of clicks and zooms.

As I was messing around on one of the maps, I realized that someone had to put all of this information into the map. Every county has different numbers. That sounds like an insane amount of man hours to me. I would like to give credit to Matthew Bloch, Shan Carter, and Alan McLean for their hard work in putting this great tool together for the rest of the world to better understand the US population.