As journalists, sometimes the toughest part of the job is getting access to public information, that is supposed to be …well.. public. We’ve all gone through the FOI maze.

Leave it to Google to bring a method to the madness. This week Google launched Google Public Data. A new search engine that will scourer databases and turn it into easy to understand information along with comparisons.

Want to compare the population rate of Santa Clara County in California with the rest of the US. No sweat! This is great perspective. The ability to compare any state and any county in the US.

So far Google is mining data from the  U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the U.S. Census Bureau’s Population Division.

But we all know when Google starts something it is only the tip of the iceburg. Imagine what can be instantly charted as this service grows. What are the most traveled roads, what are the best schools in America, which city eats the most hot dogs! (I think that’s Chicago?). But the amount of interesting information that could be compared instantly, is amazing.

We will all be saying “let me Google that” a lot more in our newsrooms in the days ahead.

Enjoy!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 at 10:08 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.