Data journalism as a future skill.
Prof. Dr Jakob Vicari joins the programme as an expert specialising in data-driven journalism and digital media forensics.
Photo: Heinrich Holtgreve
A cow swallows a sensor – and journalism takes on a new form. Jakob Vicari loves to push the boundaries of journalistic storytelling with crazy experiments. From March 2025, he will bring this passion to the Visual Journalism and Documentary Photography programme at Hannover University of Applied Sciences and Arts as a Professor of Data Journalism and Digital Media Forensics. The graduate of the German School of Journalism and pioneer in sensor data journalism has already developed numerous innovative projects: in 2018, together with Astrid Csuraji, he founded the innovation lab tactile.news in Lüneburg, specializing in dialogue formats and artificial intelligence. Students are now benefiting from his creative impulses and experimental practice.
With Jakob Vicari, the Visual Journalism and Documentary Photography degree program is specifically expanding its expertise in the field of data journalism. In future, students will combine visual storytelling even more closely with data-driven methods by developing and implementing innovative formats such as interactive visualizations, AI-supported image analyses and data-based documentary projects. This will prepare students specifically for a media market in which data-supported research, AI skills and forensic analysis skills will become competitive advantages in the journalistic profession.
I focus strongly on practical projects that help students to develop future-oriented journalistic skills.
Prof. Dr. Jakob Vicari
Vicari also teaches in the journalism degree programme (BJO) at Hannover University of Applied Sciences and Arts. His focus is on data-supported research, AI-supported storytelling and the critical analysis of digital content. Because “source criticism is more important than ever: AI-generated content must be examined particularly critically,” emphasizes Vicari. Experimenting together with students is particularly important to him – especially outside of established formats. In the 2025 summer semester, he is offering the course “Machine Masculinity”, which examines the images that artificial intelligence creates of masculinity. In the “Butterfly Diaries” project, students are developing an observation system to document the metamorphosis of butterflies. Vicari focuses on practical projects that help students develop future-oriented journalistic skills – from AI-supported storytelling to the critical analysis of digital media products.
Artificial intelligence is playing a growing role in teaching. Vicari sees it as a “superpower that we need to acquire”, but warns against increasing dependence on tech companies. According to Vicari, it will now be decided whether new tech monopolies emerge or whether it is possible to build an open, democratically controlled technology. It is particularly important that students not only use AI, but also understand it so that they can question it critically.
Vicari’s specialty is sensor data journalism – a journalistic practice in which sensors are used to generate or collect data to deepen research. This could be live data, but also recordings from data loggers. One example of this is his “Super Cows” project, in which he followed three dairy cows on three different farms for 30 days for WDR. Each cow had swallowed a sensor that transmitted data from its interior in real time: how much does a cow drink, eat or produce? The information collected was immediately published on a website and via a chatbot which users could interact with directly. According to Vicari, the aim of such projects is “to enable us humans to establish a completely different connection to our environment and the animals around us”. Projects such as “Super Cows” also illustrate how data can create new visual approaches to social issues.
AI Lab series at Faculty III
Prof. Dr. Jakob Vicari is offering the workshop “An AI idea phone for the HsH” on April 1. In 90 minutes, participants will develop an AI hotline for creative brainstorming. The digital sparring partner should not only store ideas but actively develop them further. A playful introduction to the possibilities of AI for creative processes.
The event is part of the new “AI Lab” series, in which various degree programs at Faculty III offer lectures, workshops and discussions on the potential, challenges and targeted use of AI. Sometimes practical, sometimes theoretical – open to all students, lecturers and interested parties.
Tuesday, April 1, 2025, 2 pm – 3:30 pm, in the Masterlabor, Expo Plaza 2, 30539 Hannover
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Hochschule Hannover
Faculty III – Media, Information and Design
Expo Plaza 2
D-30539 Hanover