July 29, 2008Ethnic food markets: Everybody bok choy tonightSo, you're having a hard time tracking down Asian celophane noodles? Well, who hasn't suffered through that? Got a yearning for yucca? You aren't alone. And now, thanks to Roanoke Times Food Writer Lindsey Nair and your friends in the DataSphere, it's now a lot easier to scratch those international cullinary itches. Lindsey's been writing a series of Front Burner columns on the area's ethnic markets the last few weeks, and compiling a list of them, their addresses, phone numbers and what they offer. She passed her list onto me, and it's now available as a table and map that hopefully not only tells you what's out there, but where to find it. It's a small but diverse offering of 14 markets with Asian, Mediterranean, Hispanic and other foods. Lindsey's columns offer shopping tips, so give those a read. And if you know of a market that's not on the list, let me or Lindsey know. Happy noshing. July 28, 2008Warning: This entry is 100 percent shameless self-promotionData is a sleepy enough topic already, I'm the first to confess. And some of you may think of public radio as just as big a snooze-fest (though that's an opinion I don't share.) So, what a perfect union, then, for me to appear on WVTF's Evening Edition with Fred Echols (whom my daughter, Hadley, amusingly calls "Frechols" -- sorry, Fred) to talk about the DataSphere. Fred was kind enough to take an interest in the site and my curiously-titled job -- data delivery editor. He interviewed me for about 20 minutes and either found it worthwhile enough -- or at least handy when he was desperate to fill a time slot -- to air pretty much the entire interview on evening last week. A few cuts from the interview also ran as a short story the next day on Morning Edition. So, if you're curious about how this whole DataSphere thing works, check out the interview, and learn a little bit about the man behind the curtain. (Oh, and for the sake of full-disclosure, WVTF General Manager Glenn Gleixner is my brother-in-law, though that had no bearing on this interview that I'm aware of. Fred had no idea when he called, though he did express his sympathy.) July 24, 2008Big trees: Data with bark and bytes
So, you can guess what I did when Roanoke Times Metro Editor Brian Kelley told me about a the database at the Virginia Big Trees Program. I looked up Roanoke to find the biggest sucker in there. The program, as the website itself puts it, "relies on volunteers to search for, nominate, and verify the measurements of big trees in Virginia. When a big tree is reported to the program, it is put into the Virginia Big Tree Database maintained jointly by the Virginia Forestry Association, the Virginia Department of Forestry, and the Virginia Tech College of Natural Resources." The big winner turned out to be a 90-foot crack willow (Salix fragilis, for you Latin lovers out there) at 6311 Blacksburg Rd, "on right side of house in a field. Visible from road." That's in the picture. You can search by locality, by the common or Latin name of a species, or other ways in the advanced search option. This is terrific data partly because it's fascinating for what it documents, and partly for the way it documents it: by hand, by people out in the field with tape measures and cameras and pencils and paper. Many entries include hand-drawn maps to the locations. In some ways, this is like the DataSphere's own black bear sightings map. It invites you to add to the database yourself by reporting what you've seen. That's one of the best ways the Web works these days: the best content is created by the users themselves. Think YouTube for the most obvious example. YouTube for trees? For bears? This is data doing what it can do best: becoming a conversation. Ok, that's nerdy, but then this all started with my own glee over a database of big trees. I'm more of a data dork every day. Lucky I'm married, because at this rate, I'd never get to kiss a girl again. July 17, 2008Bonus crime data: What goes down at the Salem Fair?The Roanoke Valley and Salem crime maps are updated again, and we’ve also got a bonus for you crime data junkies – a summary of crime stats from the Salem Fair, which ran July 3 to July 13. It’s courtesy of the Salem Police Department. You can imagine the fair keeps the police busy. Take a bunch of people eager for fun, put ‘em in a confined space in the heat of summer, throw in long lines for the Typhoon and the Cliffhanger, and some people are bound to, well, get out of line. In all, this year, the Salem Police report they arrested 28 people on a total of 38 charges. “The small number of those charged compared to the huge numbers of people who come through the Fair over 11 days … is great as far as we’re concerned,” said Lt. Mike Green. “I’ve worked all 21 of the Fairs and the last couple of years’ have been mostly ‘non-eventful’ from a police perspective.” Still, there are lessons to be learned by the less than law-abiding folks among us, and here are a few: Continue reading "Bonus crime data: What goes down at the Salem Fair?" » July 14, 2008Crime maps updated, plus a question for you, Data FanYou didn't get a crime data update last week, but you'll get two this week before it's all said and done. Crime doesn't take a vacation, but sometimes crime analysts do, so things slowed down a tiny bit, but no worries. We're all set now, with data up through July 7 now available both the Roanoke Valley crime and Salem felony searches. Which reminds me of a question which I reckon only you, gentle reader, can answer. When I first started posting crime data on maps earlier this year, we all marveled at how popular the Salem map was. At the time, each locality's data was on a different map. Then, thanks to some great cooperation from the area police departments, I was able to merge the data onto a single map of serious violent and property crime. I considered this an improvement -- and I still do -- because it allowed readers who lived near the city limits find crime nearby even if it was in the next jurisdiction. Criminals, after all, don't particularly care if they're in Salem or Roanoke. So far as I know, anyway, I'm not a criminal and I'm unaware if I consort with criminals. At the same time, I decided to continue with a separate Salem map and search because the Salem data I get includes all felonies reported to the police there -- including drug crime, bad checks, embezzlement, shoplifting, parole violations, and all kinds of other interesting stuff. I had the data, why not use it? The thing is, traffic on that Salem map has steadily declined ever since. So, my question is, if you're a user of these maps, why did you begin to pay less attention to the Salem data, even though it's richer and more comprehensive? I'll continue to do both maps regardless, but, still, I'd like to know, so, do tell. July 11, 2008Is this thing on?Indeed it is. The ol' DataBlog's been quiet lately, which I regret, but I don't regret that it's mainy because I took some time off. (Forgive me for not having announced that so someone could burglarize my house and thereby land my own dwelling in the crime data.) I'm back, but, alas, when you're the only guy who does your job, things tend to pile up while you're gone, and all you get on your return is the chance to do all your regular work, plus what you would have been doing the week before. But I'm caught up, and ready to blast some new data at you. Fresh in the DataSphere, please find a database of economic development data for all of Virginia's 134 localities for 2001 through 2007. This is a list of announced jobs and investment tabulated by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership. I say announced because, while companies often open and factories or expand them with promises of a certain number of jobs and spending, they don't always fully come through. Even when those promises are tied to hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer funded incentives to do business in a certain place. That said, the data is still a measure of who is keeping their local economy vibrant growing, and who isn't doing so well. There's only so much new and expanding business to go around, so things can be competitive. Some localities just aren't players in the economic development game. Look at the data and you'll see that most years roughly half of Virginia's cities and counties have no new jobs or investment. Meanwhile, some just grow and grow -- think Fairfax, for example. Roanoke, my hometown, has had some success, but not enormous success. In that period, the city had 36 announcements for a total of 2,238 jobs and $182 million in investment. Calculated per capita for comparison to other localities, Roanoke averaged a rank of 45 in jobs for every 1,000 residents over the period, and 36th in investment per 1,000 people. Could be better, but could be a whole mess of worse. How did your locality do? |
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A while ago an editor from USA Today who was teaching me about some software offered a truism about journalists with data: we always go straight for the biggest and baddest thing in a database.
