-
My name is Dan Nguyen and I'm a journalist, programmer and photographer.
Follow me on Twitter: @dancow
Read my guide to programming: The Bastards Book of Ruby.
Tag Archives: propublica
dataist blog: An inspiring case for journalists learning to code
About a year ago I threw up a long, rambling guide hoping to teach non-programming journalists some practical code. Looking back at it, it seems inadequate. Actually, I misspoke, I haven’t looked back at it because I’m sure I’ll just… Continue reading
Discussion
4 Comments
Category thoughts, works
Tags coding, Dollars for Docs, journalism, programming, propublica, Python, ruby, tutorial
ProPublica Investigates Dialysis: For-Profit Providers Flourish as Care Quality Flounders
A great in-depth look by my ProPublica colleague Robin Fields into the dialysis industry. It was a field I was barely familiar with, as only about 400,000 Americans are on dialysis, but the entitlement as grown from $135 million to… Continue reading
The Big Pharma-Dollars-for-Doctors Database, at ProPublica
Haven’t had much time to blog, or eat, or sleep in the past few months because of this project, but the first part just rolled out today (at about 2am, actually): at ProPublica, my colleagues and I collected the past… Continue reading
Discussion
Leave a comment
Category works
Tags database, Dollars for Docs, propublica, ruby on rails
“Letting Go” – The New Yorker’s Atul Gawande, on giving up life to live
Dr. Atul Gawande’s latest New Yorker piece is described as another examination on on what’s behind the cost of health care, but it serves more as a lesson on how to both cope with the finality of death and to… Continue reading
Discussion
4 Comments
Category thoughts
Tags Atul Gawande, health care, Hurricane Katrina, propublica, Sheri Fink, the new yorker
Been away for the redesign
Been stuck at the office for the past couple of weeks, but it’s been worth it. Helped with ProPublica’s redesign, which we did in conjunction with Mule Design Studio. Our journalism has always been top notch, but the site didn’t… Continue reading
Pultizer Prize at ProPublica
It’s been a huge last few days for ProPublica. My colleagues Jesse Eisinger and Jake Bernstein unveiled the result of 7+ months of reporting, a much anticipated collaboration with “This American Life” on how the hedge fund Magnetar Capital helped… Continue reading
NYT: How Unemployment Taxes are Collected; Also, Watch Your Texting Habit
A pretty interesting piece in Jay Goltz’s “You’re the Boss” blog on how unemployment tax is paid for (in Illinois, an employer can pay up to $1.48 per dollar that a former employee collects in unemployment benefits). Goltz argues that… Continue reading
Discussion
1 Comment
Category thoughts
Tags illinois, new york times, propublica, texting, unemployment insurance
ProPublica tracks the bailout, a year or so later
Today, my ProPublica colleague Paul Kiel and I put out some graphical revisions to PP’s bank bailout tracking site, including our master list of companies to get taxpayer bailout money: Nothing fancy, mostly made the numbers easier to find and… Continue reading
Discussion
Leave a comment
Category works
Tags bailout, banks, money, propublica, ruby on rails, treasury, web design, website design
Track the Hydraulic Frack: ProPublica mini-site on oil/gas wells per state, and the few staff that regulate them
My colleague Jeff Larson made this very cool site that shows how many more gas/oil wells there are per state since 2003, and the relatively small change in staff to inspect them. All done with jquery’s flot. Related story by… Continue reading
Discussion
Leave a comment
Category thoughts
Tags environment, hydraulic fracturing, jquery, propublica
Revisiting the New Orleans Police Shootings
ProPublica, with Frontline and the Times-Picayune, just started publishing a multi-part series examining unsolved shootings linked to the New Orleans police. One of the sparks for re-opening a painful chapter in the Katrina saga was this photo, captured by freelancer… Continue reading