@StevenWalling points out a quick write-up on Online Journalism Blog about a really slick real estate mash-up, Suburbified, that has been built using the New York Times Article Search API.
To me, the coolest part about this isn’t the mash-up itself—it’s that a blog about jornalism news understands the significance of an old-school media company building a data API to give third parties easy access to their data assets. From Paul Bradshaw’s Online Journalism Blog article:
So, for free*, the NYT now has a new way for people to find its articles, and a new source of traffic for its archives.
*That is, the cost of creating the database and API. Consider it a case of match-funding development costs, with the other half met by people keen to play with your ‘toys’
He’s absolutely right—the New York Times is getting volunteers to build value for them and their readers by simply providing a data API. They’re not having to spend time guessing what might work or testing prototypes—fans of their Data API are doing that for them.
You should provide access to your data, too!
One Comment
Oh I’ve been waffling about this for far too long. It’s only now I’m in a position to be telling editors they should do the same.