Technically Philly’s 2011 comprehensive technology reporting highlighted 1.10.12 0
by Brian James Kirk in Journalism

We’re excited to announce that our technology news publication Technically Philly was prominently highlighted in a report generated by J-Lab, the journalism innovation think tank based in Washington, D.C, for a number of projects that it was involved with in 2011.

Working with various partners in Philadelphia’s journalism industry through grants funded by J-Lab and the William Penn Foundation, Technically Philly was active in shaping projects that, most notably, accelerated conversation about broadband connectivity and its future and another that researched abandoned properties in Philadelphia.

Broadband2035, as we’ve written in the past, generated close to a dozen reports about the state of broadband access in the region, and how it would be represented in the City of Philadelphia Planning Commission’s citywide strategic planning document, Philadelphia2035, the first comprehensive plan put together in more than 50 years. The partnership and project helped connect the niche communities of Philadelphia’s built environment and technology, introducing an important, yet often under-reported issue.

As the report says:

Technically Philly and PlanPhilly joined forces to report on the status of the city’s broadband adoption and tie it to the city’s issuance of a citywide master plan. The biggest contribution of the project, to date, has been to actively solicit reader recommendations on the conditions of the city’s broadband infrastructure and on city residents’ hopes for the future.

See the full report on Broadband2035 and its impact here.

And working with Philadelphia City Paper and PlanPhilly, Technically Philly helped to envision and create an online tool that visualizes abandoned property in the city. The full report on that project is available here.

It was a strong year for public affairs technology news coverage, including outside of the J-Lab grants. We spent much of the first half of the year working on Transparencity, a six-month project in partnership with the Institute for Public Affairs at Temple University and funded by the William Penn Foundation, which focused on, among other topics, the City of Philadelphia’s Division of Technology efforts to work with other city agencies to modernize, curate and disseminate data sets and other relevant information for third-party developers and other action. Finally, we finished 2011 by publishing an in-depth report on the state of science, technology, engineering and mathematics education in the School District of Philadelphia.

We look forward to future collaborative efforts in Philadelphia and beyond. To read about other successes of the J-Lab Enterprise Reporting Awards in Philly, see the institution’s full report.