On a chilly Hong Kong night, not long before Christmas, about 20 hacks and hackers gathered in a busy bar to toast the first meeting of our local group. It was a casual, get-to-know-each-other type of meeting. The vibe was buzzing as a bunch of print, broadcast and multimedia journalists met with designers, programmers and a few students from HKU’s journalism school. People expressed excitement and enthusiasm to get the group up and running, and to more drinks in the name of data driven journalism.