As data enthusiasts, we believe in the power that data holds and are strong proponents for democratizing information, making it easy to share and reuse. Despite this, data scientists and those working with data in general, often struggle to communicate how and why data are essential and potentially life changing. The word data often conjures up notions of difficult to understand numbers or facts, information that is out of reach for the general population, meant for data scientists or those carrying out work that requires a certain level of expertise. This is where we feel data stories can be of great use. Data stories provide an opportunity to reflect that data is not sterile and difficult to understand , but part of wider, participatory process. We want to bring data to life!
It is with this in mind that we are launching our first Data Stories Contest. Data stories are an agile and malleable form of communication that are intended for non-specialized audiences. It differentiates itself from any other type of communications product by attempting to understand the story, context, history and people, the meaning, behind the data. Data stories can include text, interviews, videos, infographics and maps to tell a narrative in a compelling way, based on what is deemed appropriate on a case by case basis. By telling the story behind data, we empower much more people to become part of the data revolution and ensure that data does not remain just an empty statistic - but is used to invoke positive change!
In honour of International Open Data Day, taking place on March 2nd, we are inviting you to submit a data story to the Land Portal, based off of your own research or an open land dataset (see the Land Portal’s Dataset page for inspiration). Successful stories will be dynamic, engaging and original and will include innovative presentation of information (including visuals, maps, infographics or other) and lets the data speak to an audience beyond the realm of academic researchers and data scientists.
The deadline has been extended to May 14th, 2019. See attached flyer for more details on how to submit your data story.