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Publisher’s data tools set to win international honours

A regional publisher’s data unit is in the running for two international awards for innovations used on its newspaper websites.

Trinity Mirror’s central data unit has been nominated for two Global Editors Network Data Journalism Awards, which will be presented in Vienna, Austria, next month.

The unit has been shortlisted in the Open Data category for a tool that allows readers to find out who was living in their houses in 1939, based on a Register taken at the time.

The second nomination is for Best Use of Data in a Breaking News Story, after the unit created a series of quick interactive tools that can be dropped into stories.

How the 1939 register tool appeared on the website of the Manchester Evening News

How the 1939 Register tool appeared on the website of the Manchester Evening News

The tools offer information about average wage, council tax, and general wellbeing of the areas they live in – which can be added in to relevant stories on those subjects when they are posted online.

Trinity Mirror is competing against news organisations from across the world including India, United States, Brazil and Argentina for the prizes.

David Ottewell, head of the data unit, said: “We are all really proud to see team members nominated, once again, for these prestigious global awards. It is recognition of the fantastic innovative journalism that members of the unit produce every single day.

“We passionately believe that data journalism is not just about breaking stories, but also about personalising the news and finding new ways of connecting people to vital information about their lives and communities.”


 

Liverpool logoA regional daily has won two nominations at an award celebrating the best in digital media.

The Livepool Echo has been shortlisted twice in the The Drum’s Online Media Awards, with the newspaper competing for the Best Local/Regional News Site award.

Echo breaking news editor Ben Turner has also been nominated for the awards’ Online Editor of the Year prize.

In the Regional/Local News Site category, the Echo will face competition from fellow Trinity Mirror websites GetReading and Wales Online.

The Belfast Telegraph is the other regional press title nominated for the crown.

Competition also comes from the ITV News Central website, BBC News Online East and Northern Ireland-based site The Detail.

The winners will be announced in a ceremony to be held at the Marriott Grosvenor Square, London, on 7 June.


 

Journalism students have been recognised for their reporting skills at a ceremony to mark the end of their degree course.

Students at De Montfort University, in Leicester, were given prizes across a range of categories.

Alison Martin, deputy news editor of the Leicester Mercury, joined Gary Sherrard, head of communications at Leicester Tigers, and Pete Wardman, of BBC Radio Leicester, to hand out awards to the students, who will officially graduate in July.

Beth Smith is pictured below left receiving the Mercury-sponsored District Reporter of the Year award from Alison Martin, herself a former DMU graduate.

Beth Smith, left, receives the District Reporter of the Year award from Alison Martin

John Dilley, director at the university’s Leicester Centre for Journalism, said: “We’ve had fantastic support from the Leicester Mercury for more than a decade and we used their award as the centrepiece to expand into an event that provided us with the opportunity to celebrate with all our graduating students.

“We also had great support from other partners in the Leicester community to make the event really special for everyone – and then quite fittingly for a bunch of old hacks and aspiring journalists we finished up in the pub.”

The winners were:

Leicester Mercury District Reporter of the Year – Beth Smith

Best Arts and Ents Reporter – Sam Chambers

Square Mile Community Reporter Award – Tim Ince

Best Sports Reporter – Ben Clarke

BBC Broadcast Reporter Award – Amina Osman

#DMUmemories Photo Award – Paige Caldeira and Cherelle Cawthorne


 

NewsquestA regional publisher has been honoured for its work on local digital advertising products.

Newsquest has been named Most Innovative Publisher at The Drum’s Digital Trading Awards, which were held earlier this month in London.

The award follows the launch of a series of highly-targeted advertising packages for specific client groups created by the company’s central digital display team and then rolled out across the group.

It enabled local sales teams to offer highly-effective digital display campaigns for smaller clients.

Digital director Mark Smith said: “The challenge facing us was to make it easy for our local sales teams to provide our clients with not just standard display advertising but the same level of sophisticated targeting which national brands can access, whilst keeping the product, the sale and the process as simple as possible.

“I’m delighted that our digital display team rose to that challenge and they thoroughly deserve the accolade.”


 

BJTCJournalism students are being invited to enter the Broadcast Journalism Training Council’s annual awards.

The 2016 Student Journalism Awards are open to 4,000 students studying on one of the BJTC’s 70 accredited courses with a closing date of 14 September.

A new category has been added this year to recognise original journalism with the winner receiving £500.

There are nine categories in total – TV News Item, Radio News Item, TV News Feature, Radio News Feature, TV Documentary, Radio Documentary, Website of the Year, Best TV Newsday and Best Original Story.

Jon Godel, BJTC chief executive, said: “This is a great opportunity to showcase the very best student multimedia journalism. The new award for best original story is exciting. I can’t wait to watch, listen and read the entries.”

The awards ceremony due to take place in London in November. Details of how to enter can be found here.

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  • May 17, 2016 at 8:49 am
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    “We passionately believe that data journalism…etc” Why is everyone “passionate” about everything these days? I had a story recently where a man was “passionate” about accountancy (yes, I know). Anyway, I’m not sure anyone senior in Trinity Mirror is truly “passionate” about journalism (not sure what the “data” variety is) given what we’ve seen on this site recently. Whatever, stay passionate, people.

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