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Uplink Feature Stories

    Missing gas-escrow payments uncovered with data matches
    By Daniel Gilbert

    For 20 years, an obscure Virginia regulatory board has forced thousands of landowners to lease their mineral rights to private energy corporations.


    Tech Tip: Getting starting with PostGIS for geographic analysis
    By Nick McClellan

    For journalists hoping to analyze geographic data, the cost of geographic information system (GIS) software can be prohibitive. Fortunately, there are open-source, free solutions available for cost-cutting journalists who want to do spatial analysis.

    Pursuing an open-source option is easier said than done. Often, open-source software can be difficult for the lay journalist to install and even begin to understand.

    PostGIS for PostgreSQL database manager offers a solution that is free, robust and easy to use — assuming you know what you're doing.


    Getting some help with open source GIS
    By Elizabeth Lucas

    Gary Sherman's Desktop GIS: Mapping the Planet with Open Source Tools

    When journalists are looking for software, they usually greet the words "open source" in one of two ways: with confusion, because open source software is still a daunting mystery; or with delight, because the software is available for free.

    Open source software is simply software that is available at no cost and has its source code available to the public. A network of users and developers constantly enhances and expands the program.


    New Jersey's Tax Crush
    By Paul D'Ambrosio

    New Jersey residents have long lived under a broken property tax system that has more in common with feudal states than the United States. Nearly half of our $47 billion in tax revenue comes from property taxes — which are based on the government's perceived value of a person's home rather than what he or she actually earns.

    The average property tax in 2008: $7,045, or about 11 percent of the median household income. It's about four times higher than the national average, and higher than what the average worker pays in Social Security and Medicare taxes, combined.


    Sifting for recovery spending data on federal sites
    By Jake Kreinberg

    In February, Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, designed to stimulate the economy by injecting $787 billion into the nation’s infrastructure and tax relief programs. Getting a handle on that spending has proved a challenge.


    Web maps localize Iowa air pollution story
    By Chris Hamby

    Des Moines Register reporters Chase Davis and Perry Beeman spent months compiling and making sense of data for a series on air pollution in Iowa. But, with more than 1,600 polluting facilities across the state, there simply wasn’t space in the stories to mention any but the most noteworthy. That’s where data editor James Wilkerson and digital projects editor Michael Corey came in. They developed an interactive map that allowed users to see information about the facilities near them. "It localized the story to basically every community in Iowa," Davis said of the map.


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