Data Is Plural

Jeremy Singer-Vine
  • 5.0 (6)
  • SOCIETY & CULTURE
  • SERIES
Data Is Plural

A new podcast from the long-running newsletter, Data Is Plural (data-is-plural.com). Each episode distills an expert interview into a crisp 15 minutes, taking you behind the scenes of another surprising dataset. One season = five episodes.

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  1. S2E1: Jeans Pockets

    EPISODE 1

    S2E1: Jeans Pockets

    This episode’s guests are Jan Diehm and Amber Thomas, whose investigation into the sizes of jeans pockets was featured in the August 22, 2018 edition of the Data Is Plural newsletter. Amber and Jan explain how they collected the data, how much smaller they found women’s jean pockets were than men’s, and what else they learned along the way. Relevant and mentioned links: Jan and Amber’s pockets-investigation at The PuddingData on all the measurements they tookTheir data collection sheetTheme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    16 min
  2. S2E2: Income Patterns

    EPISODE 2

    S2E2: Income Patterns

    This episode’s guest is Illenin Kondo, one of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis economists behind the Income Distributions and Dynamics in America (IDDA) dataset and resource, featured in the October 11, 2023 edition of the Data Is Plural newsletter. (IDDA is a collaboration between the Census Bureau and the Minneapolis Fed.) Illenin explains how the researchers distilled two decades of confidential Census and IRS records into public statistics, what they mean by “income dynamics,” what makes the dataset special, and what they’ve learned from it so far. Relevant and mentioned links: The project's landing pageThe project’s downloadable dataThe project’s data visualization toolAn introduction to the statisticsArticles with findings from the team’s research:“The prosperity of high-earning foreign-born workers”“The geographic divide in Native incomes and earnings”“Inclusive recessions, inclusive recoveries?”Federal Statistical Research Data Centers Theme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    16 min
  3. S2E3: Missing Migrants

    EPISODE 3

    S2E3: Missing Migrants

    This episode’s guest is Julia Black, coordinator of the International Organization for Migration’s Missing Migrants Project, featured in the January 15, 2020 edition of the Data Is Plural newsletter. The project “records incidents in which migrants, including refugees and asylum-seekers, have died at state borders or in the process of migrating to an international destination.” Julia describes how her team gathers that information, the obstacles they face, how they deal with uncertainty and varying source quality, and how their approach has changed in the decade since the project launched. Relevant and mentioned links: Missing Migrants ProjectThe teamMMP’s data landing pageMMP’s data downloadsMMP’s methodologyMMP’s other publicationsStories of families of missing migrantsThe 2013 Lampedusa shipwrecksThe Human Rights Watch report mentioned, on violence against Ethiopian migrants at the Yemen-Saudi border Theme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    16 min
  4. S2E4: Canadian Wildfires

    EPISODE 4

    S2E4: Canadian Wildfires

    This episode’s guest is Bruce Macnab, head of Canada's Wildland Fire Information System, featured in the June 14, 2023 edition of the Data Is Plural newsletter. Bruce describes how his team gathers that information, the obstacles they face, how they deal with uncertainty and varying source quality, and how their approach has changed in the decade since the project launched. Relevant and mentioned links: Canadian Wildland Fire Information SystemThe agency’s datamartFire hotspot mapsFire weather mapsFire Weather Index SystemHistorical data from the Canadian National Fire DatabaseWildFireSat: Enhancing Canada's ability to manage wildfires Theme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    16 min
  5. S2E5: Crosswords

    EPISODE 5

    S2E5: Crosswords

    This episode’s guests are George Ho and Saul Pwanson, whose crossword datasets were featured in the Data Is Plural newsletter in 2021 and 2016, respectively. Saul and George explain the difference between American-style and cryptic crosswords, how they collected their datasets, and what they learned along the way. Relevant and mentioned links: Saul’s xd archive, grid comparison, and .xd file formatFiveThirtyEight’s coverage of the plagiarism scandal Saul’s analysis unearthed and Saul’s csv,conf talk, “How a File Format Led to a Crossword Scandal”George’s dataset of cryptic crossword cluesGeorge’s datasheet for the datasetTimnit Gebru et al.’s “Datasheets for Datasets”XWord Info, from which Saul gathered New York Times crossword dataDavid Steinberg’s Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project, with “litzing” contributions from Barry Haldiman and others Theme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    16 min
  6. Bonus Episode: Hold The Line (by Loud Numbers)

    EPISODE 6 BONUS

    Bonus Episode: Hold The Line (by Loud Numbers)

    This is a bonus(!), crossover(!) episode, produced by Miriam Quick and Duncan Geere's wonderful Loud Numbers podcast, which turns data into sound. Remember the Canadian wildfire data featured a couple of episodes ago? Duncan and Miriam have woven it into a sonic tapestry, threaded with descriptions of the 2023 fire season by Fern Yip, who spent much of it fighting to save her home and school from burning. You can also listen to the episode in Loud Numbers' own podcast feed, and read Miriam and Duncan's show notes for more details. Data Is Plural theme music by Nikhil Sonnad.

    23 min
See All Season 2 (6)

Trailer

Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
6 Ratings

About

A new podcast from the long-running newsletter, Data Is Plural (data-is-plural.com). Each episode distills an expert interview into a crisp 15 minutes, taking you behind the scenes of another surprising dataset. One season = five episodes.

Information

  • Creator
    Jeremy Singer-Vine
  • Episodes
    12
  • Seasons
    2
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2024 Jeremy Singer-Vine
  • Show Website
    Data Is Plural

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