I found the data on the Tegner to be quite interesting and somewhat comprehensive. One set of data that stuck out to me was the list of shark sightings in New York. I was surprised by how many sharks there were around the state, but unfortunately, a significant number were just labeled as “shark”. If we were to make an interactive map or something similar of the sharks around New York, it would have to just be about the number of sharks in general, not the kinds of sharks as many were unidentified. However, we could have sets of information on the page so that people could still learn about the different species. The Seascape article also mentioned keeping the waters clean and I think it would be a good opportunity to also educate people on how pollution affects the diverse aquatic wildlife. Even though the data is set in New York I feel like it would also be a good opportunity to decry certain practices such as shark fishing for the production of shark fin soup (which is more a delicacy in China) as the procedure is quite inhumane.
I read the article Ainu Success: the Political and Cultural Achievements of Japan’s Indigenous Minority. The cultural divide between the Japanese and Ainu is quite severe and the Ainu people have been suppressed. Because of that, I think we could help spread the unfairly suppressed Ainu culture with designs similar to Ashley (I think that is her name) or Jenny’s interactive projects. Ashley’s perfume/fragrance line would fit well with the objective I am trying to achieve as that’s what the original project did: explore other people’s cultures. Not only would people be able to see the Ainu culture from different Ainu people, but there is lots of room to explore different mediums, not just text, but videos or pictures which could be more engaging. Jenny’s text based interactive story could also be a nice way of introducing people to Ainu culture. I was thinking of a set of topics that could be explored, like food or dance, and clicking on the people would reveal what they think about said topic.