Leaving the Times

Eric Ulken on October 27, 2008

I want to say something about what took place today at the Los Angeles Times, where I’ve worked for nearly 5 years. It’s a drama that repeats itself in newsrooms across the country and has already taken place more times than I care to count during my tenure at the Times. The familiarity of the event doesn’t make it any less sad.

I refer, of course, to staff cuts. Buyouts, redundancies, layoffs, terminations, separations voluntary and involuntary — pick your term. However you put it, it sucks — both for the people who leave and those who stay. This time I’m in the former category. The decision to go was mine, and I made it months ago, but saying goodbye is still hard.

Days like today obscure the fact that hundreds of talented, creative and dedicated journalists remain at the Times. They still put out one of the best news reports in the country, and they’re working hard to drag a sclerotic institution into the digital age. I am proud to be associated with them, and I wish them well.

(My last day is next Friday, Nov. 7.  Details on my own plans TK.)

Photo by Mister-E via Flickr.

Backchannel on blogging

Eric Ulken on October 27, 2008

What happens when you put a bunch of bloggers in a room, feed them pizza and moderate a discussion on their craft? You end up with two real-time conversations: One in the physical room and the other in the Twitterverse.

I know that’s no surprise to those who populate this corner of cyberspace, but as a newbie here — and, until recently, an admitted Twitter skeptic — I have to say it was pretty fun to watch a virtual dialogue unfold alongside the real-world one, as it did last Thursday night at the Los Angeles Times.

The local ONA gathering on blogging (pix here) drew about 60 people to the Harry Chandler Auditorium for an informal talk with L.A. bloggers including Luke Ford (pictured) and the Times’ Andrew Malcolm. Tweets containing #onala were displayed in a search feed on the big screen, powered by a nifty skinnable Twitter client called Spaz. Instant visual backchannel!

So yes: Twitter is good for something besides marriage proposals.

Photo by David LaFontaine via Flickr.

New at latimes.com: California Schools Guide

Eric Ulken on September 4, 2008

Our newest database project, launched today, is a guide to schools in California with test scores, demographics and other useful info on public schools in the state. (Private schools are listed too, but there’s less good info available on them.)

Data guru Ben Welsh (of L.A.’s Top Dogs fame) is the brains behind this project, also built in Django (which, it’s safe to say, has become the framework of choice for our editorial data projects).

I think my favorite part is the ability to rank schools in your county by different criteria, such as average SAT scores or API score (California’s benchmark for academic performance). Factoid: Of the 10 schools statewide with the highest API scores, eight are in the Bay Area and four of those are in Fremont. Is it something in the water up there?

Delicious links: Er, on second thought…

Eric Ulken on August 28, 2008

My short experiment in posting my Delicious bookmarks to the blog is over. My infrequent “real” posts are getting buried, and I’m not sure that these hodgepodge daily link lists are particularly useful except to people who have the exact same tastes and interests as I do.

If you happen to be one of those people (or for some other reason you want to see what I’m bookmarking), you can always subscribe separately to my Delicious feed — or, if you use Delicious yourself, why not just add me to your network?

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

Update 2008.08.29: OK, now it’s really stopped. I swear.

New at latimes.com: L.A.’s Top Dogs

Eric Ulken on August 2, 2008

Last week we launched a fun new database at work: L.A.’s Top Dogs, which shows the most common dog names and breeds by ZIP code, based on dog registration data from L.A. County animal control agencies. My colleague, Ben Welsh, assembled the data and built the app in Django. I did the UI.

Warning: It’s pretty addictive. For example, if you ever wanted to know how many dogs are named after your favorite superheroes, dictators and hip-hop stars, we can tell you.

It’s already drawn some notice in the linkosphere:

It’s taken some criticism from folks who seem to think it’s not serious journalism. To those people I say: You’re right. Lighten up. We do a lot of other serious journalism.