Hey, I'm a fan of your work and glad you're continuing to make stuff. Just have to say, though, it seems this entire post is based on your assumptions about how newsrooms handle graphics and is not based on any research or first-hand newsroom experience.
First of all, none of the projects you mention are "99% code." They all take a ton of reporting and editorial decision-making, and they all require a deep understanding of the topics they cover. Given the full breadth of any given interactive feature, it's really more like ~10% code.
Also: "News organizations had to accept that code-driven content wouldn’t have a viable print-version. The NY Times launched a data-led blog, The Upshot, to address this tension." Really? That's why they launched the Upshot? Not to leverage their already-existing graphics desk to compete with 538 after Nate Silver left the NYT? Also, most interactive graphics you see on the NYT site also appear in print in some form.
Also: "Michael Bloomberg is subsidizing all of Bloomberg Business’s engineers in the Editorial Department. No one else is even close to making a head-count commitment." I'm not actually sure what you're trying to say here. Bloomberg's graphics desk, while very good, is actually relatively small. And they do not come from some engineering corner of the company; they're people who are experts in creating editorial graphics and interactives, and they work in the newsroom.
I'm glad you're excited about the work you cited in your post. I am too! It just seems you're missing a lot of context here.
Have you open sourced any tools or written up your process? I looked at your Trello board and none of the cards (from a random sample) had any detail beyond the title or status...
First of all, none of the projects you mention are "99% code." They all take a ton of reporting and editorial decision-making, and they all require a deep understanding of the topics they cover. Given the full breadth of any given interactive feature, it's really more like ~10% code.
Also: "News organizations had to accept that code-driven content wouldn’t have a viable print-version. The NY Times launched a data-led blog, The Upshot, to address this tension." Really? That's why they launched the Upshot? Not to leverage their already-existing graphics desk to compete with 538 after Nate Silver left the NYT? Also, most interactive graphics you see on the NYT site also appear in print in some form.
Also: "Michael Bloomberg is subsidizing all of Bloomberg Business’s engineers in the Editorial Department. No one else is even close to making a head-count commitment." I'm not actually sure what you're trying to say here. Bloomberg's graphics desk, while very good, is actually relatively small. And they do not come from some engineering corner of the company; they're people who are experts in creating editorial graphics and interactives, and they work in the newsroom.
I'm glad you're excited about the work you cited in your post. I am too! It just seems you're missing a lot of context here.