Helping journalists understand, browse and toy with API data.

Huge amounts of data are available online via APIs, but often in forms that aren't viewable by non-technical folks. This tool lets you play with examples from a handful of popular APIs.

What exactly is an API?

API stands for "Application Programming Interface." When a website (say, the New York Times, or Flickr) wants to allow you to fetch and display content from it automatically, without copying and pasting, it creates an API. This allows any computer to ask the website for information. For a comprehensive explanation of APIs, read the Wikipedia entry.