New Web Site Will Team Journalists With Programmers (sfgate.com) 51
schwit1 shared an article from the New York Times:
When investigative journalist Julia Angwin worked for ProPublica, the nonprofit news organization became known as "Big Tech's scariest watchdog." By partnering with programmers and data scientists, Angwin pioneered the work of studying Big Tech's algorithms -- the secret codes that have an enormous effect on everyday American life... Now, with a $20 million gift from Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, she and her partner at ProPublica, data journalist Jeff Larson, are starting the Markup, a news site dedicated to investigating technology and its effect on society. Sue Gardner, former head of the Wikimedia Foundation, which hosts Wikipedia, will be the Markup's executive director. Angwin and Larson said that they would hire two dozen journalists for its New York office and that stories would start going up on the website in early 2019...
Angwin, who was part of a Wall Street Journal team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2003 for coverage of corporate corruption, said the newsroom would be guided by the scientific method, and each story would begin with a hypothesis... At the Markup, journalists will be partnered with a programmer from a story's inception until its completion. "To investigate technology, you need to understand technology," said Angwin, 47... Newmark, who splits his time between San Francisco and New York, has for years kept a low profile. But he worries about what he sees as a lack of self-reflection among engineers. "Sometimes it takes an engineer a while to understand that we need help, then we get that help, and then we do a lot better," Newmark said. "We need the help that only investigative reporting with good data science can provide...."
Engineers being surprised by the tools they have made is, to the Markup team, part of the problem. "Part of the premise of the Markup is the level of understanding technology and its effects is very, very low, and we would all benefit from a broader understanding," Gardner said. "And I would include people who work for the companies."
Larson laments a world where programs handle crucial decisions, and "once they go into production, there's no oversight..." Or, as he says earlier, "Increasingly, algorithms are used as shorthand for passing the buck." The Markup's site promises " a nonpartisan, nonprofit newsroom" offering independent analysis of how technology is re-shaping everything from what we believe to "who goes to prison versus who remains free." The site's donations page adds that "We strive for fairness and independence and for us, the best way to achieve that is to operate without ads or a paywall."
Angwin tells Recode that she grew up in Steve Jobs' neighborhood in Palo Alto, and in a long interview reveals that she learned to program in a fifth grade class that a public-spirited Steve Jobs funded. Now the Times points out that the Markup "will release all its stories under a creative commons license so other organizations can republish them, as ProPublica does."
Angwin, who was part of a Wall Street Journal team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2003 for coverage of corporate corruption, said the newsroom would be guided by the scientific method, and each story would begin with a hypothesis... At the Markup, journalists will be partnered with a programmer from a story's inception until its completion. "To investigate technology, you need to understand technology," said Angwin, 47... Newmark, who splits his time between San Francisco and New York, has for years kept a low profile. But he worries about what he sees as a lack of self-reflection among engineers. "Sometimes it takes an engineer a while to understand that we need help, then we get that help, and then we do a lot better," Newmark said. "We need the help that only investigative reporting with good data science can provide...."
Engineers being surprised by the tools they have made is, to the Markup team, part of the problem. "Part of the premise of the Markup is the level of understanding technology and its effects is very, very low, and we would all benefit from a broader understanding," Gardner said. "And I would include people who work for the companies."
Larson laments a world where programs handle crucial decisions, and "once they go into production, there's no oversight..." Or, as he says earlier, "Increasingly, algorithms are used as shorthand for passing the buck." The Markup's site promises " a nonpartisan, nonprofit newsroom" offering independent analysis of how technology is re-shaping everything from what we believe to "who goes to prison versus who remains free." The site's donations page adds that "We strive for fairness and independence and for us, the best way to achieve that is to operate without ads or a paywall."
Angwin tells Recode that she grew up in Steve Jobs' neighborhood in Palo Alto, and in a long interview reveals that she learned to program in a fifth grade class that a public-spirited Steve Jobs funded. Now the Times points out that the Markup "will release all its stories under a creative commons license so other organizations can republish them, as ProPublica does."
Hilarity ensues! (Score:2)
If this isn't a set up for a sitcom, I don't know what is.
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The devs usually know very well what their tech is worth, both in design and implementation.
Yes, but not always the consequences. Do you think those who wrote video image letter recognition algorithms considered how it was going to be used by law enforcement dragnets and advertisers alike? Do you think those who programmed voice recognition or IoT message queueing considered the implications of something like Alexa?
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Yes, I'd say people programming voice recognition thought it might be used by consumers to talk to a computer that would then take action.
In other words, you have not thought much about the implications either, assuming both that it must be the consumers who do the talking, and that it's a computer that takes action. That's two misplaced trusts in one sentence.
And that, I think, is the problem a nutshell - inventors, engineers and programmers tend to trust that their products won't be to serve other purposes.
It's an old problem. Good old Montpelier likely didn't consider all the nasty things that could be dropped from a balloon, or how it c
Good luck with that (Score:3)
I really don't see anything there that would attract programmers or scientists or engineers.
What's the actual incentive for the non-journalist side, so they can attract the resources? More than market rate for short-term assignments?
I could see helping them. (Score:2)
It depends on what they're asking for. Is it a phone call every once in a while to help explain why the journalist is spewing nonsense (technically)? Or do they want me to treat it as a job. Because I could see treating it as volunteer work. I already volunteer my time to some causes I care about, and if phrased as "please make tech journalism more journalism and less press release recitation" I could see caring about that.
The state of most tech journalism is really bad. Or, please point out the source
let them pay you (Score:1, Interesting)
Why team with journalists? Journalists don't know anything, can't do anything, and don't bring anything useful to the table. In fact, if anything, they taint your work and your message with their biases and ideologies. Journalists used to be a necessary evil as gatekeepers to a costly, limited bandwidth distribution medium (paper, TV), but that function has been made obsolete. And journalists work for for profit corporations that turn your knowledge into their profits. They get something out of teaming with
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I agree. First thought that came to mind was does "teaming" mean programmers work for free and journalists get the credit of work?
My dad used to be a real journalist. (Score:2, Interesting)
I understand where you're coming from though. Nowadays, it is hard to believe, that "journalists" could be good. Much like "politicians".
But the thing is: Those are not journalists. They stole the word.
As an example of what a real journalist does:
* My dad discovered a photo where the ex Pakistani military intelligence leader Hamid Gul sat there with a CIA agent in turban and traditional clothes, and they seemed to drink tea and be best friends. Naturally, like we all would, he thought "WTF"?
* But unlike you
no respect for journalism, eh? (Score:3, Interesting)
Did your CS degree cover locating, interviewing, documenting, and protecting sources? Did it teach you how to get into and out of a war zone safely and do effective coverage while you're there? Did it teach you how to investigate a situation that smells funny? Did it teach you how to cover your tracks and avoid government and corporate censorship?
Let's turn that around and see what that disrespect feels like pointed at us:
"Why team with programmers? Programmers don't know anything, can't do anything, and do
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You can't protect your sources when you don't even understand technology. You are likely using technology you don't understand while you pretend to protect your sources, and you'll likely end up getting someone killed.
You should ask Julian Assange about protecting sources.
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Did your CS degree cover locating, interviewing, documenting, and protecting sources?
I studied journalism, a long time ago, under a veteran named Barry Watts. One of the other students once asked him about journalistic integrity, and Mr Watts gave one cynical, barking laugh, adding "You poor, naive bastards. "
And he was right.
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It is, but it isn't what programmers are paid for. Programmers are paid for delivering correct, robust, scalable, secure code, and the better ones generally do that.
Journalists frequently disrespect programmers. But why would I care? It's not about anybody's "feelings", it's about objective facts: the profession of journalism is disappearing because their "skills" aren
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True. What they don't seem to understand is that (1) engineers generally understand the consequences of their creations, whether it's a social media website or a nuclear bomb, and (2) when we don't like the consequences of our creations, we just change jobs.
Journalists are even m
I guess the first thing they will need to do (Score:2)
is form a committee to create a Code of Conduct.
Hard hitting news combined with programmers couldn't possibly have any social leanings. /s
Lets test them! (Score:2)
https://3seas.org/EAD-RFI-resp... [3seas.org] to see if they really are looking for ethics violations.
As a side dish https://3seas.org/ [3seas.org]
Oh, hell no! (Score:2)
Teaching everyone to code is a bad idea. Teaching people to code well is a good idea but, of course, most people will never be able to code well. By the same token, journalism has become a license to destroy people's lives with impunity. "Oh, I had an anonymous source." Do you really want the toxic combination of bad programmers and shoddy journalism creating, well, ANYTHING?