View slideshows of 11 national sites, 31 TV stations and 79 local papers, featuring coverage of Obama’s victory. Submit a screengrab.
More election-related resources:
Video Complements Election Coverage
Top Priorities of an Obama Administration
Page One Today / Obama’s Historic Victory
Highlighting Diverse Angles in the Elections
Don’t Drop Religion Angle After Votes Are Counted
Visualizing Data on Election Day
FiveThirtyEight Combines Polls, Reporting, Baseball
The 2008 presidential race inspired a lot of innovative storytelling, including how we experienced coverage of the historic finale last night. Many of us watched events while plugged in to Twitter and Facebook, switching occasionally to YouTube, checking to see how the U.S. is perceived overseas, watching the increasing numbers in the Electoral College.
We’re rich with tools.
Here’s a look at two projects that captured events in unique ways. Both are comprised primarily of words — one is powerful because the words are submitted by readers, in real time. The other is powerful because of the volume of information, accessible in a side-by-side form. Both have a super-smart interface. Each example shows the importance of well-crafted presentation.
Oh … and one project comes from a mainstream journalism outfit that most of us know and love, the other is pure citizen journalism.
WHAT ONE WORD DESCRIBES YOUR CURRENT STATE OF MIND?
Anyone who encountered this interactive feature from The New York Times — particularly during Barack Obama’s acceptance speech last night — saw a stream of emotion running across the screen as people contributed to a “word cloud” by typing in one word that described their current mood. The site allowed a viewer to look at words selected by McCain supporters, Obama supporters or a mix of both.
BEHIND THE CANDIDATES
Two art directors who describe themselves as “creative professionals, newshounds and registered voters who live in Brooklyn” used their curiosity, passion and skills to create an interactive site that profiles the key advisers who would play an important role in an Obama or McCain administration.
The site employs remarkably usable navigation to compare the top advisors that the nominees would likely turn to for counsel and expertise on foreign policy, national security, energy, health and economics — as well as the campaign advisors.
Lindsay Ballant and Ian Boyle did all of the research and created the interface that shows the findings in a side-by-side format. It includes at-a-glance profiles, links to articles, quotes and video clips.
So, here’s a good discussion point for the idea that “journalism” comes only from commercial news organizations. Ballant and Boyle work in media, though not in mainstream press. They openly support Barack Obama. Sources for the data they present are thoroughly documented and linked back to the original sources.
On the FAQ portion of the site, the authors say: “We support Barack Obama for president, because we think the facts speak for themselves. However, we’ve held both camps to the same level of scrutiny.”
Ballant also said, “We hope, in some small way the potential of a site in this format could lead to a new way of combining sound journalism with a unique interactive experience.”
I think it’s a fascinating project, beautifully executed. I can’t wait to see what they do next.
CLARIFICATION: An earlier version of this article identified Lindsay Ballant as an associate art director of Print magazine. She is no longer with the magazine.
