Are you smart? 2017 PSL Webdothon winners share their experiences

Valentin Bouteiller, Perrine Quesnoit, Julien Bouyssou and Manon Roulleau are student engineers of the ISIGE (Higher Institute of Engineering and Environmental Management) of MINES ParisTech-PSL; they worked with Aurélie Franc and Jean-Loup Delmas, journalism students at l’IPJ Paris Dauphine. Together, they created the blog Un dîner presque numérique ("An almost digital dinner") which was selected on January 23rd by a jury of professionals and will soon be posted on The Conversation France. They agreed to answer our questions.

PSL: You created the blog Un dîner presque numérique ("An almost digital dinner" about "smart food"). Could you briefly introduce the project?

Valentin: Our blog discusses existing and future links between digital technologies and food. Digital tools are already changing our eating habits by seeking to empower us (eating better, more local, more sustainable ...) and making our lives easier (saving time) but will the "smart" truly allow us to eat more intelligently?! In fact, the question remains, and this is precisely what we wanted to show by presenting various digital solutions related to food.

PSL: 10 days to conduct interviews, reports and deliver a blog is quite short. What did you see as the key to success?

The ability of IPJ Paris Dauphine students to guide us in the journalistic process while trusting us on the content has been a real guarantee of success. I learned a lot about journalism!

Julien: We managed to move forward in such a short time, thanks to good communication between us and the shared desire to transmit quality information.
Perrine: The ability of IPJ Paris Dauphine students to guide us in the journalistic process while trusting us on the content has been a real guarantee of success. I learned a lot about journalism! We also managed to divide ourselves quite naturally into the tasks that we liked the most, which allowed us to be effective. For example, I mainly worked on the construction of the web page.

PSL: Interdisciplinarity is at the heart of the Webdothon PSL project. How did everyone's skills and knowledge help you build your project?

I learned many ecological methods that I did not know at all, thanks to the engineers

Aurélie: The journalists have brought the form, the engineers, the background. For example, I learned many ecological methods that I did not know at all, thanks to the engineers.
Manon: Journalism students have been very good at conveying the journalistic approach: how to address people, convince them, structure and balance articles. Most of the time, we wrote in four hands: a student journalist with a student of MINES ParisTech-PSL.
Jean-Loup: Journalism is a job where you have to confront and enrich yourself with other professions to make better articles. The students of MINES ParisTech-PSL had skills and especially knowledge that we did not have, and that allowed us to greatly enrich our project. This gives a further depth to our project, which would have been missing without their contribution.

PSL: The blog you have made offers nearly 6 reports in very different places (retail stores, individuals ...). How did you choose the topics and places?

Perrine: We started by thinking about our lifestyles and the way we use digital: apps on our smartphones, the websites we consult, the living environment of everyone ... We also used what we learned at ISIGE on innovative food technologies to identify other topics.

PSL: What was your best memory?

Manon: The report of a user of greenhouses who connected with Oumeima, a student in journalism at IPJ Paris-Dauphine. The live exchange with this user was really informative and rewarding. This enabled us to compare technical information we had on this system to its actual use.
Perrine: The last day of the project! The whole team was mobilized for the final adjustments before making the blog, and when we finished, we were very proud of the work done.
Jean-Loup: The report at the connected supermarket! It turned out to be a big fail because it lacked many new technologies, but we had a lot of fun, and finally this experience inspired us with a new editorial angle: a food store with more gadget than innovative features.
Aurélie: The shooting of the "magic fridge tuto". I never put so much time to make a pie!! It took us over four hours.
Julien: The moment when we could browse our blog before the broadcast and realize the contribution of everyone in this project and the quality of the articles and reports of all the pairs with a consistency that did not seem obvious at all at the beginning of the project.
Valentin: The awards ceremony. It was rewarding to see our work recognized by professionals and experts. This gives us even more motivation to continue in our daily commitment to Sustainable Development.

PSL: What was the most difficult part?

Aurélie: We had two visions of the website: while the journalists tried at all costs to angle the subjects, the engineers wanted them to make more exhaustive articles.
Perrine: At the beginning of the project, the dialogue was difficult between "ISIGE" and "IPJ" because of our very different trainings, we had divergent opinions on the orientation to give to our blog. During the first day, the relationship was rather tense, but from the second day the dialogue improved and the oppositions turned into complementarities. We did not always agree, but we listened to each other.

PSL: If you had to summarize your experience in one sentence?

Perrine: An incredible experience of teamwork! Moreover, we will meet again soon to celebrate our victory over a meal!
Jean-Loup: "Alone we are strong, but together we are invincible."