Documenting Hate

Last updated
Documenting Hate
Logo for the Documenting Hate project.jpg
Type of project Journalism, data science
ProductsNews and data on hate crimes and bias incidents
Founder ProPublica
CountryUnited States of America
Established17 January 2017 (2017-01-17)
Website www.documentinghate.com

Documenting Hate is a project of ProPublica, in collaboration with a number of journalistic, academic, and computing organizations, for systematic tracking of hate crimes and bias incidents. It uses an online form to facilitate reporting of incidents by the general public. [1] Since August 2017, it has also used machine learning and natural language processing techniques to monitor and collect news stories about hate crimes and bias incidents. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] As of October 2017, over 100 news organizations had joined the project. [7]

Contents

History

Origin

Documenting Hate was created in response to ProPublica's dissatisfaction with the quality of reporting and tracking of evidence of hate crimes and bias incidents after the United States presidential election of 2016. The project was launched on 17 January 2017, [8] [9] [10] [11] after the publication on 15 November 2016 of a ProPublica news story about the difficulty of obtaining hard data on hate crimes. [12]

Introduction of the Documenting Hate News Index

On 18 August 2017, ProPublica and Google announced the creation of the Documenting Hate News Index, which uses the Google Cloud Natural Language API for automated monitoring and collection of news stories about hate crimes and bias incidents. The API uses machine learning and natural language processing techniques. The findings of the Index are integrated with reports from members of the public. The Index is a joint project of ProPublica, Google News Lab, and the data visualization studio Pitch Interactive. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

Response

Participation

As of May 2017, thousands of incidents had been reported via Documenting Hate. [13] As of October 2017, over 100 news organizations had joined the project, including the Boston Globe, the New York Times, Vox, and the Georgetown University Hoya. [7]

Relationship to government statistical monitoring

A policy analyst for the Center for Data Innovation (an affiliate of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation), while supporting ProPublica's critique of the present state of hate-crime statistics, and praising ProPublica for drawing attention to the problem, has argued that a nongovernmental project like Documenting Hate cannot solve it unaided; instead, intervention at the federal level is needed. [8]

See also

Related Research Articles

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References

  1. ↑ Wang, Shan (23 January 2017). "ProPublica is leading a nationwide effort to document hate crimes, with local and national partners". Nieman Lab . Archived from the original on 2017-08-05. Retrieved 2017-08-09.
  2. 1 2 Glickhouse, Rachel (18 August 2017). "Track news stories about hate with the Documenting Hate News Index". ProPublica . Archived from the original on 2017-08-23. Retrieved 2017-08-22.
  3. 1 2 Rogers, Simon (18 August 2017). "A new machine learning app for reporting on hate in America". Google . Retrieved 2017-08-22.
  4. 1 2 Wang, Shan (18 August 2017). "With data from Google News, this new tool makes it easier for reporters to track hate crimes nationwide". Nieman Lab . Archived from the original on 2017-08-22. Retrieved 2017-08-22.
  5. 1 2 Hatmaker, Taylor (18 August 2017). "Google and ProPublica team up to build a national hate crime database". TechCrunch . Archived from the original on 2017-08-22. Retrieved 2017-08-22.
  6. 1 2 Morris, David Z. (19 August 2017). "Google's new site uses artificial intelligence to track hate crimes". Fortune . Retrieved 2017-08-22.
  7. 1 2 Gockowski, Anthony (10 October 2017). "Georgetown student paper begins documenting 'bias' incidents". Campus Reform . Archived from the original on 2017-11-23. Retrieved 2017-11-23.
  8. 1 2 New, Joshua (17 February 2017). "Civil society shouldn't have to solve the problem of bad hate crime data on its own". Center for Data Innovation. Archived from the original on 2017-08-23. Retrieved 2017-08-11.
  9. ↑ Ciobanu, Mădălina (20 January 2017). "ProPublica is collaborating with newsrooms to create a national database for hate crimes and bias incidents in the US". Journalism.co.uk . Archived from the original on 2017-08-23. Retrieved 2017-08-11.
  10. ↑ Anzilotti, Eillie (3 February 2017). "This new reporting project aims to shine a light on the next year of hate crimes". Fast Company . Archived from the original on 2017-08-23. Retrieved 2017-08-12.
  11. ↑ "ProPublica and coalition of news organizations launch 'Documenting Hate' to collect data on hate crimes and bias incidents in the most complete, sustained effort to date". ProPublica . 17 January 2017. Archived from the original on 12 August 2017. Retrieved 2017-08-11.
  12. ↑ Thompson, A.C.; Schwencke, Ken (15 November 2016). "Hate crimes are up—but the government isn't keeping good track of them". ProPublica . Archived from the original on 2017-08-11. Retrieved 2017-08-11.
  13. ↑ "Thousands of hate crimes reported to ProPublica's database". Latino USA . 10 May 2017. Archived from the original on 2017-08-23. Retrieved 2017-08-09.
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