Internet giant, Google has launched its new resource platform geared towards aiding reporters in researching and investigative reporting. Launched yesterday, News Lab is a website powered by Google's numerous tools and collaborations with popular media websites such as Youtube among others.
Google's critics have raised their brows over the global corporation's mission of making information around the globe universally available. This, not a few have pointed out, may result to violating intellectual property rights, and taking information on face value, especially among journalists. As such, Google has launched Newslab, a site that organizes resources that aid in news writing and reporting.
With links to various news bodies and Google tools readily available, with instructions to match, the popular online engine takes a step towards cementing its role in journalism and information organization.
News Lab features Google's combined efforts with various sites, including Witness Media Lab, a collaboration with the site of the same name, which filters eyewitness videos and accounts, and also delves into human rights issues, in depth; Fusion Tables, a database of charts and maps that show demographic figures, like homeless rates in a certain country; and, Google Trends, which keeps tabs on what is making waves in specific counties or the world over, and Verge, a collaboration with the Youtube channel that features short documentaries.
News Lab also provides information on the latest investigative instruments for reporting and researching, following Google's partnership with websites such as Hacker/Hackers, Matter, and TechRaking.
The news platform also offers tutorials for budding journalists and training materials from journalists themselves. It utilizes its many information gathering and processing tools to show that at a time when virtually everyone is a reporter and a news watcher via the social media, News Lab is a news source with variety and viability.
Adding to its artillery of reporting tools are avenues for citizen reporters to contribute to the news force via the aforementioned Witness Media Lab, Youtube Newswire, and First Draft, the official Google Blog stated.
While Google has initially received flak for allegedly disregarding intellectual property rights and not considering the process of responsible journalism, News Lab, by making Google tools and resources readily available and organized, paves the way for Google's initiatives to have a growing role in journalism to be visible, concrete, valid, and accessible.
