Greetings, hacks and hackers! If you’re in North America, this week is your last chance to apply for the Google News Initiative Innovation Challenge. The deadline was extended until Wednesday.

If you’re in the Middle East, or looking to move there, we have a ton of jobs this week based in Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Worth a read:

• R is surging in popularity this year, going from the TIOBE Index’s 20th most popular programming language last summer, to 8th most popular this summer
• A data journalist in Brazil manually collected data from each state’s health secretary and discovered that the federal government was undercounting COVID-19 deaths
• With elections around the world coming up, the American Press Institute wrote nine tips for covering election misinformation, including being transparent about your fact-checking process and writing more direct headlines

Job openings:

• China - Web Developer, South China Morning Post
• Egypt - Social Media Journalist, The National
• Lebanon - Multimedia Producer, The National
• Saudi Arabia - Social Media Journalist, The National
• UAE - Deputy Head of Multimedia, The National
• UAE - Multimedia Producer, The National
• UAE - Product Manager, The National
• US - Senior Producer, Austonia.com
• US - Data Reporter, Climate Nexus
• US - Audience Editor, Colorado Public Radio
• US - Investigative Reporter, Connecticut Mirror
• US - Digital Journalist, The Forward
• US - Investigative Editor, Honolulu Civil Beat
• US - Deputy Editor of Data & Graphics, LA Times
• US - Multimedia Producer, The National
• US - Digital News Editor, New Hampshire Public Radio
• US - Digital Editor, New York Amsterdam News
• US - Newsroom Developer, San Francisco Chronicle

Upcoming events:

• Aug 9-15, Online, AAJA Conference
• Aug 27-30, Online, IRE Conference
• Sep 16-17, Online, Media Party 2020
• Sep 23-27, Online, Environmental Journalism Conference
• Sep - Nov, Online, EIJC & Dataharvest
• Oct, Online, African Investigative Journalism Conference
• Oct 23-25, Online, Association of LGBTQ journalists (NLGA)
• Oct 1-16, Online, Online News Association Conference
• Dec 4-6, Online, Journalism & Women Symposium

Other opportunities:

• August 11, Training from RFE/RL for Eastern/SE European journalists
• August 12, Apply for the Google News Initiative Innovation Challenge
• Rolling deadline, Apply for funds for a solutions journalism freelancer
• Rolling deadline, Funding to cover Covid in Black Sea countries
• Rolling deadline, National Geographic grants to cover COVID-19
• Rolling deadline, FIJ grant for Americans to cover COVID-19
• Rolling deadline, IWMF relief grant for COVID-19 struggles
• Rolling deadline, ECFJ grants for stories on elections, AI, disinformation
• Rolling deadline, Ukraine Media Development Fund
• Rolling deadline, Fund for Environmental Journalism Rapid Response