Examining How We Measure Our Lives
Commentary, critiques, and observations on information design and data visualisation
-
Read on…: Oh Great Gatsby
Income inequality basically means that the wealth of a country, in this case, is unevenly distributed with most of it falling in the hands of a very few people or families. Think the era of, as the title alludes to, Gatsby and the 1920s before the Crash. Broadly speaking, a middle class requires a more […]
-
Riding the Rail to London?
Read on…: Riding the Rail to London?Long time readers know by now that I advocate high-speed rail and similar transport infrastructure investment. The following screenshot was taken from a BBC News video about the Russian proposal to build an underground passenger/freight tunnel beneath the Bering Strait to connect eastern Siberia to Alaska. The video is not an infographic, strictly speaking, but […]
-
European Debt Crisis Explained
Read on…: European Debt Crisis ExplainedThe European debt crisis affects all of us. Shares fall on the exchanges in Frankfurt, Paris and London and then ripple westward to New York before finally reaching Hong Kong and Tokyo. But does anyone understand actually understand who owes whom what? This interactive piece is yet another from the New York Times and is […]
-
What’s In a Name?
Read on…: What’s In a Name?Gadhafi is dead. Sorry, I meant Kadhafi. Again, apologies, Qadaffy. For so many years we have tried to spell the now deceased dictators name. It’s been in Saturday Night Live (sadly I cannot find a clip online). It’s been in the West Wing. So how can it be done? The problem is that his name […]
-
The Northeast Passage
Read on…: The Northeast PassageThe Northeast Passage was supposed to be a shortcut to Asia from Europe through an open waterway in North America. Many tried to find the route. They failed. Because we have a mountain range running from the northernmost part of North America to the Isthmus of Darien where, perhaps desperate for the route, we dug the Panama […]
-
Show Me the Money
Read on…: Show Me the MoneyCampaign finance is always an interesting subject during election cycles. I believe I have heard that once a congressman wins election he needs to raise $1000 per week to stand a chance of re-election in two years’ time. One need only imagine the difference in scale for presidential contests. Or do you… The New York […]
-
What’s In a Tweet?
Read on…: What’s In a Tweet?Tweeting in 140 characters would seem to give one little information, aside from interesting ways of shortening and truncating the English language. However, if you dig just a little deeper than the blurb of text, one can find a whole lot more information that companies—surprise—find valuable. This graphic, originally by Raffi Krikorian at Twitter, is […]
-
The Secret Message Within the FedEx Logo
Read on…: The Secret Message Within the FedEx LogoFor the logo designers, via xkcd:
-
Surveying Sentiment
Read on…: Surveying SentimentHow do you feel about the economy? The New York Times has posted an interesting interactive visualisation detailing the sentiment expressed by participants—defaulting to the most recent 100—answering several questions on the state of the economy. As a survey, this is—and it is framed as such—an unscientific sampling of trending opinions of only those who […]
-
Less Pie for Fewer Less Fortunate Foreigners
Read on…: Less Pie for Fewer Less Fortunate ForeignersForeign aid is the ‘soft’ power of a country vis-a-vis the ‘hard’ power of military force. Think blankets with ‘from the USA’ during earthquake relief in Kashmir instead of Abrams tanks in Kandahar. Some also goes to building infrastructure and increasing the standard of living for those in emerging countries. If you boost the income, […]