NOTE: This how-to was written for the Census API at http://thedataweb.rm.census.gov/ -- it has since been moved to http://api.census.gov/
Mike Stucka, our contact at the Macon Telegraph, sent us a link to the Census's official API which is launching next month. You can skip ahead to the site - http://www.census.gov/developers/ - and get an API key, but also read my notes after using this yesterday:
- The datasets
--- The 2010 Census Summary comes from everyone filling out census forms, and you can get stats at state level down to a super-detailed block level. Info from this includes population, age, gender, race, home ownership, members of a household, and various combinations of that. Full list: http://www.census.gov/developers/data/sf1.xml
--- The 2006-2010 American Community Survey is a longer form given to fewer households over 5 years (so its numbers are incompatible with the 2010 Census). You can get stats down only to the block group level. In addition to the standard census stats, you get: educa