Data journalism has been a big focus for us at the Google News Lab over the past three years—in building tools, creating content and sharing data with the data journalism community. We wanted to see if we’re taking the right approach: how big is data journalism, what challenges do data journalists face and how is it going to change?

Up until today, we really haven’t had clear answers to those questions. So, in collaboration with PolicyViz, we conducted a series of in-depth qualitative interviews and an online survey to better understand how journalists use data to tell stories. We conducted 56 detailed in-person interviews with journalists in the U.S., UK, Germany and France and an online survey of more than 900 journalists. Our analysis offers a glimpse into the state of data journalism in 2017 and highlights key challenges for the field moving forward. 

The result is one of the first comprehensive studies of the field and its activity. A decade ago, data journalists there was only handful of data journalists. 

Today, this research shows that:

• 42% of reporters use data to tell stories regularly (twice or more per week).
  
• 51% of all news organizations in the U.S. and Europe now have a dedicated data journalist—and this rises to 60% for digital-only platforms.
  
• 33% of journalists use data for political stories, followed by 28% for finance and 25% for investigative stories.
  

There is a big international variation, even within our study. In France, 56% of newsrooms have  a data journalist, followed by Germany with 52%, the UK with 52%, and the U.S. with 46%. Despite its huge growth, data journalism still faces challenges as we head towards 2018.

• 53% of the sample saw data journalism as a speciality skill that requires extensive training, and is not easy to pick up.

• Survey respondents also discussed the time pressures they face and the limited bandwidth from dedicated data journalists who can clean, process, and analyze data. We found that 49% of data stories are created in a day or less.

• Our research also found that data visualization tools are not keeping up with the pace of innovation. As a result, reporters are building their own solutions: a fifth of data journalists use in-house tools and software, whether it’s data visualization tools or even data cleaning solutions.

More than half of respondents want their organizations to use more data to tell stories. But, some felt the return on investment was unclear as the production of data journalism can take significant time and resources.

The future of data journalism, though, has never been as important as it is today, nor as much a part of the way journalists work every day, as this study shows. As one of our interviewees put it:

We heard from one data journalist in the U.S. that “data is a good way of getting to the truth of things ... in this post-truth era, this work is increasingly important. We are all desperately searching for facts.”

FOMO: that feeling you get when you fear you're missing out on something super awesome, interesting or important to you: like a fun gig in the local park, an important school board meeting, or a community clean up down the road from your house.

Well, Community Updates could be your solution. It will bring you information about news and events happening right in your own backyard so you’ll always know what’s going on.

Even though Google News helps you understand what’s happening around the world, we realized that it wasn’t easy for people to get information about their own communities.

So we used machine learning techniques to find additional sources publishing local content— like hyperlocal bloggers and high school newspapers—and we realized these and other local sources deserved their own unique space. The redesign of the Google News earlier this year provided a place for this type of news to live—a tab at the top of the page called Local. That means everything from this outdoor donut and craft beer pairing event in Rochester, or students organizing a hackathon next door to the Googleplex at Mountain View High School, to this list of open restaurants and grocery stores in Houston during Hurricane Harvey will be easier than ever to find and keep tabs on.

Community Updates builds on the work we’ve been doing for the last decade in highlighting local information and publications (we first launched local sections in 2008). Last year we expanded to all 81 Google News editions and put a spotlight on local sources of national news.

We hope Community Updates will make Google News even more useful, so that you’re not worried about missing out on cool events and opportunities around you. At the moment this feature is only available in the U.S. in English on news.google.com and will be available in the Google News & Weather App later this fall. More information on Community Updates is available here. See our Publisher Center for more on Getting Into Google News.

For the News Lab, elections are opportunities to empower journalists with the technology and data they need to keep their readers informed. For the German election on September 24th, our efforts are formed around three key themes: promoting accurate content, offering data that provides helpful context, and surfacing unheard voices.

Guiding all of these efforts is a spirit of experimentation and collaboration with news partners to address the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities digital reporting presents.

Promoting accurate content

On September 4th, alongside Facebook, we began helping two organizations—First Draft and Correctiv—monitor misleading information during the German election. First Draft is a coalition of organizations dedicated to improving skills and standards in the reporting and sharing of information that emerges online. Correctiv is the first nonprofit investigative newsroom in the German-speaking world. Its fact-checking team started a few months ago and is a member of the International Fact Checking Network.

As a part of our partnership with Corrective, we funded and supported a team of journalists from across Germany called WahlCheck17 (Election Check 17). The team will work in a pop-up newsroom opened at the Corrective office to verify and fact-check online news stories and conversations in real-time during the final few weeks before the election. The team includes fact-checking experts from First Draft and Corrective, experienced students and graduates from the Hamburg Media School, and freelance journalists.

In the same vein as First Draft’s work on CrossCheck in France and our partnership with Full Fact during the UK general election in May, the WahlCheck17 team will alert German newsrooms by publishing a daily newsletter that lists the most popular rumors, manipulated photos and videos, and misleading articles and data visualizations circulating online, and offers additional context on the sources.

Using Trends to offer additional context

Google Trends offers insight into the candidates, parties, and moments that dominate the election campaign. Our new Google Trends election hub highlights search interest in top political issues and parties, with embeddable graphics that show what people across Germany have been most interested in throughout the election campaign.

2Q17, a unique data visualization created by the renowned data designer Moritz Stefaner, depicts queries that Germans are searching for in relation to the top candidates. This project is part of Google News Lab’s series of visual experiments to develop innovative and interactive storytelling formats to cover important news moments.

Surfacing unheard voices

During the French presidential election, the News Lab partnered with a publisher to surface the views of voters across France in 360. Now we’re working with Euronews on a similar project to surface unheard voices in Germany. In partnership with German regional media outlets, who will provide context on the socioeconomic conditions of their respective regions, this project will provide an immersive journey through Germany in the weeks leading up to the election. Watch the first episode starring Masih Rahimi, an Afghan migrant and IT trainee living in Passau.

For the News Lab, elections are opportunities to empower journalists with the technology and data they need to keep their readers informed. For the German election on September 24th, our efforts are formed around three key themes: promoting accurate content, offering data that provides helpful context, and surfacing unheard voices.

Guiding all of these efforts is a spirit of experimentation and collaboration with news partners to address the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities digital reporting presents.

Promoting accurate content

On September 4th, alongside Facebook, we began helping two organizations—First Draft and Correctiv—monitor misleading information during the German election. First Draft is a coalition of organizations dedicated to improving skills and standards in the reporting and sharing of information that emerges online. Correctiv is the first nonprofit investigative newsroom in the German-speaking world. Its fact-checking team started a few months ago and is a member of the International Fact Checking Network.

As a part of our partnership with Corrective, we funded and supported a team of journalists from across Germany called WahlCheck17 (Election Check 17). The team will work in a pop-up newsroom opened at the Corrective office to verify and fact-check online news stories and conversations in real-time during the final few weeks before the election. The team includes fact-checking experts from First Draft and Corrective, experienced students and graduates from the Hamburg Media School, and freelance journalists.

In the same vein as First Draft’s work on CrossCheck in France and our partnership with Full Fact during the UK general election in May, the WahlCheck17 team will alert German newsrooms by publishing a daily newsletter that lists the most popular rumors, manipulated photos and videos, and misleading articles and data visualizations circulating online, and offers additional context on the sources.

Using Trends to offer additional context

Google Trends offers insight into the candidates, parties, and moments that dominate the election campaign. Our new Google Trends election hub highlights search interest in top political issues and parties, with embeddable graphics that show what people across Germany have been most interested in throughout the election campaign.

2Q17, a unique data visualization created by the renowned data designer Moritz Stefaner, depicts queries that Germans are searching for in relation to the top candidates. This project is part of Google News Lab’s series of visual experiments to develop innovative and interactive storytelling formats to cover important news moments.

Surfacing unheard voices

During the French presidential election, the News Lab partnered with a publisher to surface the views of voters across France in 360. Now we’re working with Euronews on a similar project to surface unheard voices in Germany. In partnership with German regional media outlets, who will provide context on the socioeconomic conditions of their respective regions, this project will provide an immersive journey through Germany in the weeks leading up to the election. Watch the first episode starring Masih Rahimi, an Afghan migrant and IT trainee living in Passau.