This article presents ACLED, an Armed Conflict Location and Event Dataset. ACLED codes the actions of rebels, governments, and militias within unstable states, specifying the exact location and date of battle events, transfers of military control, headquarter establishment, civilian violence, and rioting. In the current version, the dataset covers 50 unstable countries from 1997 through 2010. ACLED’s disaggregation of civil war and transnational violent events allow for research on local level factors and the dynamics of civil and communal conflict. Findings from subnational conflict research challenges conclusions from larger national-level studies. In a brief descriptive analysis, the authors find that, on average, conflict covers 15% of a state’s territory, but almost half of a state can be directly affected by internal wars.

Hegre, Håvard et al. (2012) Predicting Armed Conflict, 2010–2050. International Studies Quarterly, doi: 10.1111/isqu.12007 
© 2012 International Studies Association The article predicts changes in global and regional incidences of armed conflict for the 2010–2050 period. The predictions are based on a dynamic multinomial logit model estimation on a 1970–2009 cross‐sectional data set of changes between no armed conflict, minor conflict, and major conflict. Core exogenous predictors are population size, infant mortality rates, demographic composition, education levels, oil dependence, ethnic cleavages, and neighborhood characteristics. Predictions are obtained through simulating the behavior of the conflict variable implied by the estimates from this model. We use projections for the 2011–2050 period for the predictors from the UN World Population Prospects and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis. We treat conflicts, recent conflict history, and neighboring conflicts as endogenous variables. Out‐of‐sample validation of predictions for 2007–2009 (based on estimates for the 1970–2000 period) indicates that the model predicts well, with an area under the receiver operator curve of 0.937. Using a p > .30 threshold for positive prediction, the true positive rate 7–9 years into the future is 0.79 and the False Positive Rate 0.085. We predict a continued decline in the proportion of the world's countries that have internal armed conflict, from about 15% in 2009 to 7% in 2050. The decline is particularly strong in the Western Asia and North Africa region and less clear in Africa south of Sahara. The remaining conflict countries will increasingly be concentrated in East, Central, and Southern Africa and in East and South Asia.

This article examines computational journalism as a craft practised in Norwegian newsrooms. Based on in-depth interviews with expert practitioners in six of the largest newsrooms in Norway, we find that computational journalism represents a continuation of traditional (investigative) journalism. While the skills and tools necessary to do this kind of journalism diverge from the typical journalist's, the values and aims align well with tradition. Even though computation enables journalists to cope with the size and scale of journalistically appealing datasets, we find little evidence for computational journalism to increase the efficiency of doing journalism or in any other way rid journalists from low-level technical work.

Hackathon-style events are increasingly used to facilitate cross-disciplinary learning and innovation in the media industries. Based on an observational study of a hackathon organised as part of the film festival Nordic Panorama (NP) we analyze the challenges in using the hackathon format to facilitate cross-disciplinary learning and innovation for filmmakers, developers and designers. We find that many participants experienced frustrations resulting from a lack of programming skills and their expectation that the hackathon should result in "something digital". Additionally, ideals for authorship embedded in the working cultures of film and TV professionals impeded the team's ability to involve all participants on an equal footing. As implications for future hackathons we suggest organisers should consider using tools for end-user development and generative toolkits to facilitate digital making and collaborative learning. We also suggest similar events should avoid including project owners if the group work is based on existing projects.