Not All Charts Are Necessary

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by

Brendan Barry
in

I will be trying to do a longer piece on the data visualisations surrounding the shootings in Orlando later this week. But for starters, a simple point through this piece from the BBC—not that they are the only culprits of this. Not all data-driven stories need visualisations. Sometimes a nicely typeset table will do the job better and faster.

Green circles?
Green circles?

An actual table with typographic emphasis on the tables would have been better and clearer than this. Or with a little more time and effort—not that those always exist in a journalism organisation—something more appropriate to the type of data could have been designed.

Credit for the piece goes the BBC graphics department.

Comments

3 responses to “Not All Charts Are Necessary”

  1. Tables of Insight – Coffee Spoons

    […] I opined about how simple tables can convey meaningful information without the aid of unnecessary chart elements. […]

  2. Not All Charts Are Necessary Part 2 – Coffee Spoons

    […] Monday I examined a chart from the BBC that in my mind needlessly added confusing visual components to what could have been a straight table. So here we take a look at some other options that could have been used to tell the same story. The first is the straight forward table approach. Here I emphasised the important number, that of those killed. I opted to de-emphasise the years and the injured in the table. Also, since the bulk of my audience is from the United States, I used the two-letter states codes. […]

  3. Coverage of the Orlando Shootings – Coffee Spoons

    […] Monday I stated that I would attempt a longer piece on the graphics explaining the shootings in Orlando. Since I do […]

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