Episode 53: Conversation with Betsy Ladyzhets & Dillon Bergin (Muckrock)

Our latest podcast discusses how open source intelligence can power your environmental investigations. Sam Leon from DataDesk and Ben Heubl from Süddeutsche Zeitung talk us through their investigative pieces using OSINT to uncover hidden stories of environmental wrongdoing. We also hear the tools and data skills used to find and tell such stories.

The intersection between race and environmental justice has never been more apparent. As more vulnerable communities bear the brunt of climate change, how can climate journalism reflect their experiences? In this episode, we spoke with Dana Amihere, founder of AfroLA News, and Melba Newsome, a freelance journalist focused on environmental justice issues. The duo take us behind the scenes by sharing how they cover these issues. We also hear what data sources help them to find stories and inform their climate reporting.

For decades journalists have examined the global ramifications of climate change on the international stage. But as local communities become more impacted by extreme weather, journalists need to deliver reporting on climate justice through a local and solutions lens. In this episode, we spoke with Alex Harris from The Miami Herald and Tahmid Zami from Thomson Reuters Foundation. The pair draw on their reporting and data skills sharing their experiences of covering climate change from the United States to Bangladesh.

Climate change is one of the most pressing issues of our time. So what can data journalists do to help audiences understand this complex issue and help evade audience apathy? Powering your climate stories with visualisation is one way to awaken emotion and inspire change. To delve further into this, we caught up with information designer Duncan Geere, data journalist Pei Ying Loh from The Kontinentalist, and visual journalist Rodolfo Almeida from Nucleo. They talk us through their climate stories and share their best practices for visualising climate solutions journalism.

In our latest episode, we spoke about the importance of using collaboration to tell better data stories. Muckrock's Betsy Ladyzhets and Dillon Bergin talk about the power of working with local journalists and scientific experts to find hidden stories. The pair also give us an overview of Muckrock's tools that can help journalists hold governments to account.

In our latest episode, we spoke about the importance of archiving data journalism. Bahareh Heravi from The University of Surrey and Simon Rogers from Google discuss the challenges and the solutions to address this growing problem of lost content.

In our latest episode, we sat down with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists to discuss the Uber Files. The investigation, first leaked to The Guardian, reveals how Uber flouted laws, duped police, exploited violence against drivers, and secretly lobbied governments during its global expansion. Data journalist Karrie Kehoe and data & research editor Emilia Díaz-Struck talk to us about what was involved in investigating and building a narrative around this massive data leak of 124,000 files.

This episode explores how to approach data journalism in a closed-information society like Iran. We spoke to Tehran Bureau's Marketa Hulpachova, director of investigations and research at the independent media outlet. She explains the economic challenges for everyday people inside the sanctioned country and how these protests differ from previous ones. We also learn how her corruption investigations use publicly available information to explore the business ties and growing wealth of leading figures in the Iranian regime.

This Conversations with Data podcast episode explores how journalists are grappling with Freedom of Information requests around Europe. We hear how the UK, Ireland and Romania's access to information laws differ, along with the challenges in successfully filing FOI requests and navigating the appeals process.

This Conversations with Data episode explores how journalists from Texty.ua, The Insider and OCCRP cover the Russia-Ukraine War with data. We also examine how data collection processes work for the humanitarian sector with ACAPS.org and what this means for reporting on the conflict.