As a journalism educator I believe people who teach journalism should also practise it. Would you respect a medical professor who had never practised medicine, or a legal educator who had never practised law? So here is my latest piece, published online and in print in The Age in Australia.

Gasoline in the US is about half the price that we pay for petrol (same thing) in Australia. The exchange rates are almost the same: $1 in Australia is about 96 American cents. The distance the crude is transported is about the same. So why is petrol so much cheaper in the US?

Numbers and journalists do not always mix. Here is an excellent site to help journalists convert numerical units (litres, kilograms, metres) into someting their audience can relate to. You simply type the number into a box and the site coverts those numbers into someting an audience can visualise. Did you know, for example, that 13,000 kilometres is equivalent to twice the Earth’s radius, or two Amazon rivers? This post also appears on my other blog, Globalmojo.