NY Times Starting To Recognize That Data Is News

from the all-the-data-that's-fit-to-release dept

Last year, we pointed out that, after quite a slow (and, at times, backwards looking) start, it appeared that the NY Times was finally figuring out how to truly embrace the web. That meant more than just putting its newspaper online, but taking advantage of the unique opportunities opened up by the web. However, there was still plenty of room for improvement, but it appears that the NY Times continues to move in that direction. Two years ago, we wrote about how newspapers should start freeing up their data via APIs so that others could make useful applications out of it. News organizations often have a tremendous amount of useful data that others might not have access to. Putting it to good use by opening up an API would be a truly valuable service.

And that's exactly what the NY Times appears to be doing, if only on a limited scale (for now). It's set up an API for campaign finance data, allowing anyone to build useful tools or visualizations on top of it. And, that's not all, they're also getting ready to release an API for movie reviews. In other words, the NY Times is definitely recognizing the value in not just freeing up their stories, but making core underlying data totally accessible and useful.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: api, data, news
Companies: new york times


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Bruce P, 17 Oct 2008 @ 7:45am

    be careful

    I always thought it was a bad idea that the NYT makes you register to read an article. Companies have to be careful about technology, for instance in their payrollsystems, that info is very confidential, like Soc Sec numbers

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.