Judging from the activity at Indiana CAR, the next challenge facing computer-assisted reporters will be navigating the quagmire of Intranets. Sounding more like a spelling bee than a journalism conference, terms such as TCP/IP, ODBC and ASP were heard throughout the halls of the Hyatt. And although it's easy to get lost in the technical aspects of setting up an Intranet, there is a simple, journalistic motivation driving CAR specialists and database editors to immerse themselves in acronym hell - sharing data with the rest of the newsroom.
"A reporter has easier access to a government computer thousands of miles away than a colleague's computer three feet away," said Tom Torok of The Philadelphia Inquirer. "In such an environment, each computer and journalist is an island. However, the information could be made available to all, quickly and securely, through client/server arrangements."
At the conference, Torok, George Landau of NewsEngin Inc., Tom Boyer of The Seattle Times, and Bill Miller of the Battle Creek Enquirer led roundtable discussions on the choices available in setting up an Intranet.
"Journalism is about answering questions quickly and authoritatively, and a well-stocked client/server system helps reporters do just that," Landau said. He pointed out that these systems provide the best way to keep large amounts of clean, reliable data-such as voter registration, property, and corrections records - readily available for deadline queries.
Indiana CAR marked the first time a NICAR conference has offered such extensive coverage of Intranet technology. The response was enthusiastic. "I was shocked at the number of people we had in our session," said Boyer. "This field is changing so rapidly. As the demand for client/server systems in newsrooms grows, so too will the necessity for CAR specialists to learn the technology. "The classes and panels gave folks a taste, but I think they wanted more," Torok said. "In the future, I'd like to see an all-day workshop where people can bring in samples of their databases and walk out with a finished application."
But will the trend toward Intranets push CAR specialists into the role of full-time propeller heads? Most people argue that although the impetus for setting up an Intranet will have to come from the newsroom, the long-term goal should be to get the information-systems experts involved.
"I think the ideal situation might be that you have technology-savvy journalists who can oversee these projects, but full-time database wonks, whose skills are way beyond journalists', to set up and maintain the systems," Boyer said.
Landau emphasized that cooperation between the two departments is possible as long as (information-systems) people are working for, not against, the newsroom." Client/server realms such as data cleanup and verification, he said, should remain newsroom chores because they involve journalistic judgment.
In the long term, assuming the technical hurdles of setting up an Intranet don't consume all your energy, you should have more time for the real work of journalism. If all reporters can quickly and easily access the information they need, then CAR specialists may spend more time on hard-core analyses. "Even if the resident CAR guru has to do most of the work, setting up the server can still save time in the long run because it allows reporters to do more digging on their own," Landau said.
Once a client/server system is in place, Boyer and Torok stress that all kinds of information can shared. The Seattle Times, for instance, is experimenting with free-text queries over its Intranet. Not only can structured databases be shared throughout the newsroom, but Boolean searches of huge text blocks can be run.
"Don't just think of 'data' as in databases," Torok said. "Just about any form of information - spreadsheets, text, graphics, even Power Point presentations - can be manipulated and made searchable to suit your staff's needs."
In the long term, assuming the technical hurdles of setting up an Intranet don't consume all your energy, you should have more time for the real work of journalism. If all reporters can quickly and easily access the information they need, then CAR specialists may spend more time on hard-core analyses.