What is this?

Data journalism has existed since at least the 1800s. But in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, journalism is still slow to innovate, with only a handful of outlets doing any data reporting.

This newsletter is an attempt to explore what data journalism could be in that part of the world.

Who am I?

My name is Nicu Calcea, and I’m a journalist based in London, UK. I’m currently a Senior Data Investigator at Global Witness, and before that I worked at BBC News and the New Statesman. I also teach data journalism at City, University of London.

For the purposes of this newsletter, I’m just a guy with a computer and too much free time.

Why subscribe?

If you want to be the first to find out when I publish something new, you should subscribe. It’s free!

For now, I don’t have a publishing schedule, but expect an email about once a month.

You can also follow me on Mastodon, Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

What’s up with the name?

Samizdat was a form of self-publishing in the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc, largely of banned or censored texts. Data is, well, data.