Europe According to [Insert a Country Here]

This comes via the blog The Map Room. Designer Yanko Tsvetkov created a series of maps that most wholly, completely, and accurately represent the cultures, peoples, and attitudes of various European countries towards, well, other European countries. Some of the usual suspects are in there, the Brits, the French, and the Germans. However, I find the Bulgarian perspective, my screenshot choice, of interest because one does not typically find Bulgaria in the list of usual suspects. (Though one perhaps should as it is a member of the European Union unlike the Norways, Switzerlands, and Icelands of Europe.)

Europe from Bulgaria
Europe from Bulgaria

Anyway, these are funny—even if one does not necessarily understand the background to the humour there are enough that even we Americans can understand.

It’s the Economy Stew-pot.

Oh Cal Richards…

But anyways, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research—the people who declare when recessions and such begin and end—the recession that began in December 2007 ended in June 2009. Good news of a sort. And so naturally the press covered it, including the Wall Street Journal.

They included this image:

Three Charts of the Recession as Compared to Earlier Recessions
Three Charts of the Recession as Compared to Earlier Recessions

One, the drop shadows are unnecessary and the giant diamonds hide the actual turning point. The former could be eliminated and therefore allow the line to have greater, crisper detail as the colour should be enough to differentiate the lines. The drop shadow just sort of blurs everything together. The diamond could either be smaller or simply denoted on the timeline and thus allow the entirety of the line to be shown.

What I do appreciate, however, is that the first two charts show the same timeline and therefore allow for an easy comparison of the GDP turnaround to the jobs turnaround. And as one can see, while the recession has ended, if this most recent one is to follow in the paths of its predecessors, jobs will be a long time in returning to pre-recessionary levels.

Knots for the Weekend

Diagram of the Vegas Slipknot
Diagram of the Vegas Slipknot

Courtesy of Feras, this is from the magazine Complex that was the light entertainment for the office this day. It is, of course, an advert for Las Vegas. But in a magazine apparently aimed at men, this felt like a good Friday evening, i.e. pre-bar or other, mixed-gender, social outing, information graphic to share.

The two-page advert
The two-page advert
Types of Knots
Types of Knots

Immaculately Conceived

Immaculately Conceived
Immaculately Conceived

I normally do not comment on advertising and such, but I found this story, via the BBC, of interest. This British advertisement for Antonio Federici ice cream, with the tag line ‘immaculately conceived’, has been banned for mocking Catholics on the eve of the Pope’s visit to the United Kingdom. I found it funny and clever and was disappointed to hear that the advert had been banned. This second image is from the same campaign. No word on whether it too has been banned.

We Believe in Salivation
We Believe in Salivation

These are screen captures from the ice cream company’s website. According to Campaign the company did the work in house, specific credit not given.

Delaware, Home of Tax Free Shopping and Political Upsets

The big voting day in November is slowly—or rapidly—approaching. But before we get to the main fight, we have all the small-ring events to tease us. And to whet our appetite for magic walls and holographic projections and all the other technological wizardry that shall amaze and astound us all, we have nice graphics about the primaries.

Screenshot from the Delaware Senate Primary Page
Screenshot from the Delaware Senate Primary Page

This comes from the New York Times, in particular covering the Delaware primary where Mike Castle, long-time moderate Republican, has lost his party’s primary to a Tea Party candidate. (One wonders what would happen if the Tea Party candidates ran as an actual third party instead of co-opting the Republican party.) In general, the Times has there coverage pretty nailed down.

It is worth checking out their site for the mid-terms coming up if not for the news but then for the maps and charts they use to visualise all the data. (And with modern-day polling, how could we ever not have enough data to visualise?) After all, I will probably comment upon their work a few more times before Election Day.

Turkey Votes…Against Orange

Turkish Vote Results
Turkish Vote Results

I like maps, I really do. And I also like politics. And that means I love election maps. Or just voting maps. This here comes from a Turkish news outlet, Today’s Zaman, via the Economist’s article on the election. A (very) brief background for those unfamiliar with the matter at hand: Turkey wants to be admitted into the European Union (EU), but the EU requires reforms made to the Turkish constitution to bring Turkey up to EU standards in terms of law, liberalism, &c. All well and good, except that Turkey has a unique history of being a staunchly secular country where Islam is the dominant religion. Relaxing the rules against Turkey’s strict brand of secularism has stoked resentment and controversy from those on the staunchly secular side. And the constitutional changes that upset this group of people are being enacted by a political party whose history is that of a party based in Islam. It gets a bit tricky…

But about the graphic…

First, I think a good if not expected place to start is with the three-dimensional pie chart and map. These two visual elements add little if not subtract from the overall graphic. By putting the ‘No’ vote in the background it is made to appear smaller than the ‘Yes’ vote and can be seen as marginalising that portion of the vote. Furthermore, note the change in the colour of the type for each section of the chart. While the orange and white is certainly a high contrast, the black versus white is even higher.

As to the map, I am not an expert in Turkish geography, but this appears to simply be adding a weird three-dimensional effect to the edges of an otherwise flat map. At least I should hope the map is otherwise flat and not distorting the geography. One can always make the argument that a map is not needed to show a single datapoint, in this case the ‘victor’ in the vote. However, from the perspective of an American not familiar with Turkish provinces (assuming they are indeed called provinces), this map is far more meaningful than would a statistically  more valuable chart highlighting the discrepancy in the vote. After all the little miniature pies in each province are largely useless except in the most obvious of differences. To actually show and detail the degree of victory a bar chart for all provinces would be more useful.

Or perhaps a compromise that would show each province in a colour that reflects the overall victor, yes or no, and the degree to which that camp beat the other through use of a gradient. Would that be ideal for showing the details of the numbers? No, not at all, but it would highlight that while the ‘No’ vote was concentrated along the western and northern provinces—do they share a political similarity because of their bordering on the Aegean or some other reason?—but that the strongest ‘No’ vote was in the very northwest—geographically the most European part—of Turkey, excepting some exceptional province in the centre of the country. None of this, of course, deals with the density of the population in each province, for none of that is known to me as a non-Turkish observer.

The colours, white and orange, work when considered against the blueish background. Of course, why the bluish background? It might be a branding element or some other such visual styling well-established with the news outlet with which I am unfamiliar. But if not, it does not really add anything other than that glossy feel. The white as a choice for the ‘Yes’ vote is interesting, because it draws more attention to the presence of the ‘No’ vote in the north and west whereas the positioning of the wedges of the pie in the pie chart would hint that the important element to draw forward is that of the ‘Yes’ vote. In terms of the message or the thesis of the graphic, I am unsure. However, using white to allow the orange to come forward is itself a nice visual touch to bring out one or the other camp. Now if only I could figure out which the graphic was going for…

All in all, it is an interesting piece that puts the news story in more context than I might typically read in a straight, text-only article. It has some flaws, but that might be owing to my perspective as an outsider looking in.

Thomas the Tank Engine, Meet Señor Jose AVE

This comes from an older article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, but it is new to me. Anyway, it looks at a proposal for high-speed rail in the United States, specifically along the Northeast Corridor, the Washington to Boston route that includes Baltimore, Wilmington, Philadelphia, and New York. Anyway, go figure that we still have trains that run at a snail’s pace, even Acela has a low average-speed.

Comparing Routes and Modes of Travel
Comparing Routes and Modes of Travel

A proposal from a group out of Penn makes for an interesting debate, specifically in Philly a real high-speed route would require boring underneath most of Philadelphia to bypass 30th Street. Perhaps revitalising Market East—depending on how exactly the route would interact with the commuter tunnel currently in place.

The graphics are simple, basically an annotated map. But the variations in stroke weight and colour help bring contrast to the routes when looking at the entire proposal whereas the proposed route in Philadelphia has little overlap and could have made due with a single stroke. Another interesting piece is beneath in the comparison between travel times from Washington to Philadelphia, from Philly to New York, and New York to Boston. Without looking at cost—thought the article’s second page or graphics does that—we can clearly see that a dedicated high-speed rail system would make it even easier to travel between cities for short holidays or even day trips. Let alone business trips.

Clerks. And Not the Death Star Discussing Type.

The New York Times has a story about the clerks supporting the Supreme Court justices. And how, surprisingly, the Supreme Court is polarised. Truly surprising considering how unpolarised—or would it be depolarised—the remaining two branches of government are these days. Sarcasm aside, the staff at the Times put together a diagram to explain the polarity.

Where all the clerks go
Where all the clerks go

My only real concern, however, is the potential for an audience disconnect. While you and I may know who John Marshall and William Brennan are, would the rest of the infographic’s readers? Does that mean not to include the justices? Personally, I always believe that design should lift and educate people and that designers should always avoid ‘dumbing things down’ for their audiences. Maybe not having the information in the diagram helps, and it will spur casual readers to do their own research. Or perhaps the targeted audience are those who have a grasp of the history of the Supreme Court.

Show Me Some Love

(Based on a news story, this is sort of a non-designy post. More of a ranty post. So I beg your leave for a couple of words or two.)

I love Philadelphia. I wish I could say I was born and raised there, but I was born in the Lehigh Valley and raised in Chester County. But, I went there a lot. And then eventually went to university there. Like any city, it has its pros and cons. One of the cons, for me, was its creative economy. Or seeming lack thereof. (Hence the whole Chicago thing). With New York only a few miles up the road, most people head there. But there are still creative people living in Philly. And if they are anything like the whole youngish, 21st centuryish generation, they are probably blogging.

So seriously, Philly, what is with the blogging tax? Yeah, I know it is only on those blogs generating income (principally through ads). But I mean you already have the wage tax. How much more do you need to stifle innovation?

If Kites Could Fly to the Future, What Would They Find?

If only Benjamin could see this…

The Control Room
The Control Room

These are photographs from a small series published by CNET that focuses on a power grid control room. As one can imagine, managing the flow of electrical energy across somewhere the size of New England could be a bit…complicated. And so one can see from some kind of network map (perhaps?) on the main display. At the very least I can make no sense of it.

Voltage Map (right) and Monitor of Neighbouring Power Grid (left)
Voltage Map (center) and Monitor of Neighbouring Power Grid (left)

On the other hand, I only wonder what would happen if Homer were sitting behind a bank of those monitors?

Photographs by Martin LaMonica, CNET