Author: Brendan Barry

  • Show Europe the Money

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    The Guardian has an interactive piece that details payments to and from European Union member states to institutions, determining whether each state is a giver or receiver. The concept sounds all well and good. However, the piece itself feels clumsy with too much scrolling and whipping about to pan across the whole EU. The charts…

  • Fresh Water Bulge in the Arctic Ocean

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    The BBC has an article on a discovery of a growing bulge of fresh water in the Arctic Ocean. The top of the article includes a large set of graphics that explains the story below and links to an animation. The animation depicts the growth of the Arctic ice sheet from the pressure beneath and…

  • How the Costa Concordia Sank

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    The Costa Concordia sank nearly a week ago, but the questions of exactly how and why she sank will likely linger for much longer. The BBC has had extensive coverage of the story, including this page that details what is known about how and why the cruise ship sank.

  • Game Difficulties for AIs

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    from XKCD a chart on the difficulty of games for computers: And remember folks, the score is still Q to 12. A free Get Out of the Boomerang Zone card if you get the reference.

  • School’s Out For Ever

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    While on holiday, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced a sweeping series of school closures and consolidations in an effort to create a smaller and more sustainable school system. As I spent my earlier years of education in the parochial system I had more than a passing interest in the story. The Philadelphia Inquirer mapped out…

  • 12 Days of Christmas (Corporate-ified)

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    Guess what? It’s Christmas season. I am taking two weeks holiday starting tomorrow and so posting here shall be rather light until early January. In business world, people like PowerPoint presentations with charts that show the flow of synergy. Scales of efficiency. Action item prioritisation. The kinds of things that the rest of us don’t…

  • Earth-sized Planets

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    We have finally discovered two planets outside our solar system that have roughly the same size as Earth. Unfortunately, unless we learn that life can exist in the form of fire beings, these two planets are too close to their sun to support life. Their temperatures are in the hundreds and thousands of degrees. A…

  • The Family Tree of Kim Jong Il

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    Kim Jong Il is dead. And nobody really knows what is going to happen in North Korea. But, what we do have, is the interactive family tree of Kim Jong Il, courtesy of the BBC. Select individuals are clickable and have short biographical sketches. Unfortunately, the tree has been simplified for clarity and it does…

  • The Rise of Newt

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    The Iowa caucuses are quickly approaching. And that means for many candidates a scramble to gain as many supporters as possible and then convert their poll ratings into votes. For the Republicans, this has been a truly topsy-turvy cycle with the distant refrain of “anyone but Mitt” echoing in the background. So, here we are…

  • The Finances of Social Security

    —

    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    Simple graphs can tell great stories with little annotations. This graphic by the New York Times illustrates that point well with a stacked line chart set behind a line on the same scale. The two should match, or at least the red should be beneath the greys. When they don’t, you have a story and…