WATCH: Rappler, GEN host hackathon for leading media orgs in PH

MANILA, Philippines – In a country faced with various natural disasters every year, how can the government and the media work together to mitigate or even prevent the loss of lives?

As the Philippines celebrates National Disaster Consciousness Month, Rappler, in partnership with the Global Editors Network, will gather teams representing major media organizations and schools in the country to develop digital tools for journalists.

Known as the Philippines Editors Lab, the two-day hackathon event will focus on the theme, Crisis Reporting in the Philippines. It will be held on July 7-8 (Thursday and Friday).

During the workshop, the participants will try to answer the following questions:

• How can newsrooms cover disasters accurately and effectively?
• How can news and humanitarian organizations collaborate with government to help
• prevent casualties in a crisis situation?
• What role does prevention and education play in the reporting process?
• What innovations can teams bring to existing mobile and crowdsourcing tools to improve them?
• Can these tools serve newsrooms in the event of other types of emergencies (i.e. terrorist attacks)?

“With a new administration coming in and new technology constantly changing our lives, it’s a great time for news teams to come together and think about a constant problem we deal with: How can we have real world impact in our work dealing with disasters?” Rappler CEO Maria Ressa said.

Participating groups

Composed of a journalist, a web developer, and a graphic designer, the participants will work together to create news prototypes such as apps, interactive visualizations, games, widgets, or even new features for their websites.

Below are the participating media organizations:

• GMA
• Philippine Daily Inquirer
• D5 Studio
• PTV 4
• SunStar
• SunStar SuperBalita Tabloid
• Rappler
• Visayas State University Web Team
• Visayas State University

To better understand disaster management in the country, speakers from government agencies that are at the frontlines when disasters strike are also invited:

• Dr. Mahar Lagmay (Director, Project Noah)
• Mr. Felino Castro (Director, Information and Communication Technology Management Service, Department of Social Welfare and Development)
• Former Undersecretary Alexander Pama (Former Executive Director, National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council

Journalism and technology combined

The participants will present their prototypes to a jury of media and disaster experts during the Editors Lab Conference, the closing ceremony of the Philippines Editors Lab.

Communication students from various journalism and communication schools will also attend the conference.

“It’s a chance to think about 3 factors: journalism, technology, and the real world impact when we combine them both. It’s about closing the loop in civic engagement and, from our unique position, to help find a solution to an ongoing problem,” Ressa said.

The winning team’s prize is the opportunity to take part in the Editors Lab Final in June 2017 in Vienna, Austria, at the GEN Summit. – Rappler.com

Below is the program:

Day 1 – July 7 (Thursday)

8:30 – 9:00: Registration & breakfast

9:00 – 9:30: Welcome to the Philippines Editors Lab

Opening remarks

Welcoming by GEN and presentation of the Editors Lab programme & rules

9:30 – 10:30: Speed Geeking

Each participating team has 3 minutes to present to each other the most innovative project released by their newsrooms in recent months.

10:30 – 11:00: Coffee Break

11:00 – 11:45: Google workshop

   Catherine Candano (Strategic Partnerships Development, Google)

    (Mobile first tools and analytics for publishers)

11:45 – 12:30: DDR workshop

    Dr. Mahar Lagmay (Director, Project Noah )

     (Importance of mitigation and preparedness in reducing casualties during disasters)

    Felino Castro (Director, ICTMS, Department of Social Welfare and Development)

     (Challenges in communicating critical needs during disaster response)

12:30 – 13:00: Brainstorming session

13:00: Lunch break

14:00: Brainstorming session

16:00: Coffee break

16:30: Brainstorming & working session

18:00: Mini pitch session

Teams will have 1 minute to:
– Describe the problem they are trying to solve
– Describe their target audience
– Give a one sentence description of their prototype

19:00: Cocktail & finger buffet

Day 2 – Friday 8 July

8:30 – 9:00: Breakfast

9:00 – 9:10: “How to Pitch” workshop

9:30 – 1:00: Working session

13:00: Lunch break

14:00: Last sprint working session

15:30: Project submission deadline
The participants must submit their projects on the GEN Community website

Editors Lab conference

16:00 – 16:05: Opening of the conference

Sarah Toporoff (Programme Manager, Global Editors Network)

16:05 – 16:10: Welcome Remarks

Maria Ressa (CEO, Rappler)

16:10 – 16:30: Keynote

Usec. Alexander Pama (Former Executive Director, NDRRMC)

16:30 – 17:30: Final pitches by Editors Lab teams – 5 minutes for each team

17:30 – 17:45: Pratiksha Rao (Head of Media Partnerships, Twitter)

17:45 – 18:00: Maria Ressa (CEO, Rappler)

18:00: Announcement of the winning team