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kontinentalist.bsky.social
Kontinentalist
@kontinentalist.bsky.social
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Kontinentalist is a studio that advocates for a more equitable world that fosters connections between Asia’s sources of knowledge. We nurture community around data and human experiences 🌟
https://kontinentalist.com
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Kontinentalist @kontinentalist.bsky.social · 27d
In our latest story, we explore what it takes for a Kpop fan to collect the merchandise they want, and the consequences of that.

kontinentalist.com/stories/kpop...
The Physical Phenomenon
With Apple Music and Spotify dominating the way we listen to music these days, why are physical albums so popular among Kpop fans?
kontinentalist.com
kontinentalist.bsky.social
As the world looks to COP30 this month, we’ve been thinking about how hard it can be to truly care about climate change when the conversations around it often feel distant. Yet, we feel its effects daily—the days are unbearably hot, the nights less cool, and the weather more unpredictable.

(1/7)🧵
November 10, 2025 at 8:37 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
What does authenticity look like in the age of algorithms?

Check out our newsletter's latest issue 💌 kawan.kontinentalist.com/what-creates...
A cover illustration for notes from the equator issue #68. The title is "What createa authenticity?". The illustration depicts a child with a happy, content expression about to eat a spoonful of fried rice. It's done only in lineart with soft swishy brushes, a mix of greys and warm reds. A soft, low-opacity yellow circle is placed on the nose and mouth, subtly emphasising the act of eating and smelling.
November 2, 2025 at 2:47 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Kpop artists frequently release albums that come with randomised merchandise.

However, this means that fans often buy several of the same albums just to collect all the merchandise.

Unwanted albums are then thrown out, resulting in literal piles of waste on the streets.
An image of a fictional chat interaction between two Kpop fandom friends. It reads: user xolovestars: OMG, did you see? Astronyx are having a comeback in November! user astronaut_nyx: OMG, where did you see that? 🤩 xolovestars: On their Instagram page! A screenshot of a fictional Instagram promo is attached. It says, "Stars Aligned out 08.11.2025." astronaut_nyx: Ahh! I'm so excited! I wonder what the concept of this album will be this time!! I can't wait to see Harin's new look omg 💖 xolovestars: It seems like there are two versions... Dreams and Paradise. A promotional image for Stars Aligned album is attached here, featuring CD covers, posters, photo cards, ornaments, and photo books in two versions. astronaut_nyx: Oh boy... If I want to collect only Harin's photo cards, how many albums do I have to buy?! xolovestars: It'll be tough 🥺 Every time we buy an album, we don't know which photo cards are in it... astronaut_nyx: And there are also so many variations of photo cards in this album! One for each member and each member has a Dreams and Paradise themed version... Is there another way I can buy Harin's photo cards without having to buy the actual album? 😦 xolovestars: There's the secondhand market, you can wait for resellerd to buy in bulk and resell the photo cards. But Harin's pretty popular, right? The more popular the member is, the more expensive the cards will be 💀💀💀 astronaut_nyx: Yeah, I heard my classmate said she got Red Velvet Irene's photo card for 500 bucks 💸 during their last comeback! Oh man 😧 I feel so bad every time I buy so many albums though. Really feels like a waste xolovestars: I know... Did you see? There were albums thrown out on the streets. Fans buy the albums in bulk for the merchandise inside and then throw away the packaging and CDs. A screenshot of a tweet is attached here. The user, which is anonymised, is a responding to a photo of a cardboard box full of CDs on the street. The tweet says, "What is anyone supposed to do if you leave your trash here like this?"
October 21, 2025 at 10:22 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Patchar Duangklad is a Visual and Data Journalist who’s the co-founder and business developer at Punch Up, a Bangkok-based data storytelling studio, and WeVis, their civic technology arm.

Today, we’re looking back at our interview with Patchar in 2023:
kawan.kontinentalist.com/meet-the-com...
A quote excerpt from our Meet the Community interview with Patchar Duangklad. It says, “[I want to tell my audience,] “Don't be afraid of data”. One day, I want to make [data storytelling] easier for people and make it more relevant to them. And when we reach that [vision], I think it's gonna be a lot of fun.” There's a photo of Patchar. She's a Thai woman with shoulder-length hair, smiling at the camera. She's wearing a black shirt and jacket. The shirt says "Punch Up and WeVis".
October 16, 2025 at 4:18 AM
Reposted by Kontinentalist
acaciathorns.bsky.social
I am so entraced by @kontinentalist.bsky.social way of publishing. It's engaging, told through data visualisation as much as the narrative form. For example, this used gameplay elements: kontinentalist.com/stories/popu...
What’s the state of Southeast Asian sci-fi?
Western science fiction often depicts our collective culture in restrictive, erroneous ways. How about we let Asian sci-fi speak for itself?
kontinentalist.com
October 14, 2025 at 8:35 PM
Reposted by Kontinentalist
gijn.org
🔍 In some of the world’s toughest environments, Asia’s data journalists are finding new ways to keep the truth visible – even when data is scarce or censored.

Meet @indiaspend.com, @kontinentalist.bsky.social & Punch Up in GIJN’s #AsiaFocus series:
gijn.org
Data Journalism in Asia: Rethinking the Relationships Between Newsrooms, Communities, and Evidence
twp.ai
October 12, 2025 at 8:30 PM
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lapisstory.bsky.social
Track your projects’ impact and ensure you’re making the difference you want to see.
October 7, 2025 at 3:01 AM
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lapisstory.bsky.social
Lapis supports customisation and collaboration, and works across multiple skill levels and domains.
October 7, 2025 at 3:01 AM
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lapisstory.bsky.social
Today, we are lifting the waitlist and bringing you the Open Beta version. Blend text, data, and visuals together with our exciting new features.
October 7, 2025 at 3:01 AM
Reposted by Kontinentalist
lapisstory.bsky.social
Made by award-winning editorial studio @kontinentalist.bsky.social, Lapis advocates for craft, collaboration, and community. We help users tell their own stories, work alongside their teams, and build meaningful connections with other practitioners.
October 7, 2025 at 3:01 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
🚀 Exciting news: Lapis is now in Open Beta!

Built by our team at Kontinentalist to make data storytelling accessible for everyone in Asia and beyond.
Check it out → lapis-story.com
lapisstory.bsky.social Lapis @lapisstory.bsky.social · Oct 7
We're officially hard launching our Bluesky account and our Open Beta phase! But first, some introductions—

This is Lapis: an all-in-one platform that allows users to create compelling data stories that inform, engage, and inspire.
October 8, 2025 at 12:53 PM
Reposted by Kontinentalist
gijn.org
The Cost of Transitioning to Clean Energy

Asia holds vast nickel, cobalt & lithium reserves key to the green transition, but mining is often harmful. @kontinentalist.bsky.social dives into impacts in 🇵🇭 & 🇮🇩 using @FairFinanceAsia data & an interactive quiz.

https://twp.ai/1MQB1Hv
October 3, 2025 at 7:04 PM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Aghnia Adzkia is a Visual and Data Journalist who’s passionate about making data journalism accessible for the general public.

Get to know her experience as the founder of Journocoders Indonesia, a community of data enthusiasts based in Jakarta! 👩‍💻
kawan.kontinentalist.com/meet-the-com...
A quote from our Meet the Community interview with Aghnia Adzkia. It says, “It’ll be great if one person learns something new and shares it with other people, and someone else does the same. Instead of one person learning everything without sharing with or consulting others, which will drain them of time and resources, we should overcome challenges as a community.” There's a photo of Aghnia herself, an Indonesian woman with an open smile. She is wearing a cream-coloured hijab, white shirt, and red fabric necklace with flowery batik pattern.
October 3, 2025 at 7:28 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
The infrastructures required for renewable energy, such as solar panels and electric vehicles, are built using raw materials known collectively as “transition minerals”.

How much do you know about transition minerals? Try out this quiz and see how you fare! 👇 (1/10)
September 22, 2025 at 8:55 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Last month, during an internal Learning Day, Aishah asked the team, “Who here thinks of themselves as creative? The kind of person who can come up with ideas easily?”

Out of 13 people, only Munirah identified as ✨creative✨.
The rules of the ideation process: Grab an A4 paper and draw 20 circles in a 5x4 grid. Let’s fill the circles with drawings in 2 minutes. Additional points to note: come up with as many ideas as possible, and don’t just limit yourself to the “right” ideas. I first learnt the Double Diamond framework in a UX course. Double diamond is a design thinking framework which begins with discovering and defining the problem, to ideating and testing solutions. As someone who had trouble ideating, I loved learning that the ideation stage is divergent and a judgement-free space! This means that anyone can be creative! Let’s see how the team did?
September 15, 2025 at 8:58 AM
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kontinentalist.bsky.social
We’ve just unveiled 𝑨 𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒐𝒘𝒏 𝒅𝒓𝒂𝒘𝒊𝒏𝒈, a new 6x12m artwork and data storytelling project at the Singapore Art Museum! The work explores how, why, and where we walk, through an exploration of desire paths in Singapore.
A photo of A line of our own drawing. The wall mural is divided into 3 main sections: An 8-metre wide wall with four maps of different locations in Singapore and colourful stylised collage of desire paths in Singapore, a 1-metre wide pillar with a legend outlining different types of desire paths according to our speculations, and a 2-metre wide wall featuring the title and introduction to the artwork.
August 26, 2025 at 2:58 PM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
We’ve just unveiled 𝑨 𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒐𝒘𝒏 𝒅𝒓𝒂𝒘𝒊𝒏𝒈, a new 6x12m artwork and data storytelling project at the Singapore Art Museum! The work explores how, why, and where we walk, through an exploration of desire paths in Singapore.
A photo of A line of our own drawing. The wall mural is divided into 3 main sections: An 8-metre wide wall with four maps of different locations in Singapore and colourful stylised collage of desire paths in Singapore, a 1-metre wide pillar with a legend outlining different types of desire paths according to our speculations, and a 2-metre wide wall featuring the title and introduction to the artwork.
August 26, 2025 at 2:58 PM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
What if we started seeing accessibility as a practice of care embedded in every part of our lives? For our latest Meet the Community series, we sat down with Equal Dreams to reimagine accessibility in our workplaces and larger lives.

kawan.kontinentalist.com/ways-of-seei...
Ways of seeing accessibility with Equal Dreams
Accessibility is becoming an increasingly ubiquitous term used by practitioners in different fields, from researchers to designers to developers. Yet how the term is understood and how it’s practised ...
kawan.kontinentalist.com
August 20, 2025 at 11:16 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Lim Chee Aun, a Singapore-based engineer and data viz builder, turns a simple curiosity into applications that solve people’s problems in their daily lives.

Learn more about his creative process behind apps like BusRouterSG through this interview! 👇
kawan.kontinentalist.com/meet-the-com...
A quote excerpt from our Meet the Community interview with Lim Chee Aun. It says, "For me, ideas come from being aware of things around you. For example, when I walk along the street, or when I look at a website, I'd wonder, "Why is it a red colour?" Then I'd dive deep into the thing anf try to figure out why." There's a photo of Chee Aun himself, a developer from Malaysia. He has short hair and an open, curious expression.
August 15, 2025 at 5:52 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Our latest issue of our monthly newsletter opens us up to the diversity of human experience, and imagines a world where accessibility is a norm.

Check it out 💌
kawan.kontinentalist.com/spectrum-of-...
Cover illustration of Kontinentalist's newsletter, notes from the equator, issue #65. Five hands, fingerspelling "Hello" in Singapore sign language, form a circle with colourful strings connecting them together. The title says "spectrum of accessibility".
August 6, 2025 at 3:13 AM
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hellopeiying.bsky.social
Our reflections on a recent project we did about nature for the Singapore Art Museum. It's still on display! If you're in town, do check it out <3
kontinentalist.bsky.social Kontinentalist @kontinentalist.bsky.social · Jul 21
What do trees say about coloniality and what we value? We recently worked on The Hidden Green, a large-scale mural artwork on trees in Singapore, which got us questioning our relationship to nature and the price we pay for modernity and planning needs.

A thread of our reflections 👇 (1/7)
July 23, 2025 at 2:31 PM
Reposted by Kontinentalist
hellopeiying.bsky.social
Thank you @reginecabato.bsky.social for talking to us about our work, and @reutersinstitute.bsky.social for this feature! Slow journalism/news takes a more intentional practice in today's changing media landscape. We talk about how @kontinentalist.bsky.social navigates this.
reutersinstitute.bsky.social Reuters Institute @reutersinstitute.bsky.social · Jul 21
The latest edition of our roundup on journalism is out, featuring a new report on Brazilian news deserts, an article on a startup reinventing data journalism for Asian audiences and the killing of a journalist in the Philippines

Click to read, share and subscribe
www.linkedin.com/pulse/journa...
Journalism Today. 21 July 2025
By Eduardo Suárez and Gretel Kahn 🗞️ 3 top news stories 1. An innovative startup reimagining data journalism in Asia.
www.linkedin.com
July 23, 2025 at 2:30 PM
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niemanlab.org
Co-founder @hellopeiying.bsky.social stressed that @kontinentalist.bsky.social looks at qualitative impact over ad revenue and arbitrary readership figures.

“The metric we do care about is: If people do read it, what do they do about it?” www.niemanlab.org/2025/07/char...
Charting myths, debt, and monkey farms: How Kontinentalist is reimagining data journalism in Asia
"In Southeast Asia, data can be quite scarce, and it’s often controlled by people in power."
www.niemanlab.org
July 21, 2025 at 9:00 PM
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gquaggiotto.bsky.social
Lovely (and well deserved) profile of @kontinentalist.bsky.social reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/news/chartin...
Charting myths, debt and monkey farms: How Kontinentalist is reimagining data journalism in Asia
The co-founder of this startup explains how they are using immersive formats to report on everything from China’s influence to wildlife trade.
reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk
July 22, 2025 at 7:17 AM
kontinentalist.bsky.social
Arts and culture stories are close to our heart, especially projects that re-connect us to our roots. In the last five years, we’ve worked on a couple of stories centred around local knowledge and traditions, our latest being a project on Malay folktales with the Malay Heritage Centre.
July 23, 2025 at 2:28 PM