Examining How We Measure Our Lives
Commentary, critiques, and observations on information design and data visualisation
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Read on…: A Wetter Midwest
Here in Philadelphia, I think yesterday was the first day it had not rained in over a week. Not that everyday was a drenching storm, but at least showers passed through along with some downpours and definitely grey skies. But what about my old home, Chicago? Well, FiveThirtyEight turned to a longer-term look and examined how over the century the…
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Gun Control Legislation
Read on…: Gun Control LegislationBack in March I posted about a great graphic from the New York Times editorial board they made in the wake of the Parkland, Florida school shooting. Saturday morning, the day after Friday’s Santa Fe, Texas school shooting, I was reading the paper and found the updated graphic. Yeah, almost nothing has changed. Congress passed and the president signed an…
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Study Up
Read on…: Study UpIt’s Friday, everybody. We made it. So now go and hit the books this weekend and study up. Thanks to xkcd, we know a little bit more about areas of research. I just am wondering where design is. Or economics. Credit for the piece goes to Randall Munroe.
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Turning the Midwest Red
Read on…: Turning the Midwest RedContinuing with election-y stuff, I want to share a fascinating map from the Washington Post. The article came out last week, and it is actually incredibly light in terms of data visualisation. By my count, there were only two maps. The article’s focus is on interviews with Trump voters in 2016 and how their opinions of the president have changed…
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Pennsylvania Primary Night
Read on…: Pennsylvania Primary NightSurprise, surprise. This morning we just take a quick little peak at some of the data visualisation from the Pennsylvania primary races yesterday. Nothing is terribly revolutionary, just well done from the Washington Post, Politico, and the New York Times. But let’s start with my district, which was super exciting. Moving on. Each of the three I chose to highlight…
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Tracking the Women Running for Office
Read on…: Tracking the Women Running for OfficeYesterday we talked about a static graphic from the New York Times that ran front and centre on the, well, front page. Whilst writing the piece, I recalled a piece from Politico that I have been lazily following, as in I bookmarked to write about another time. And suddenly today seemed as good as any other day. After all, this…
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Women Running for Congress
Read on…: Women Running for CongressIf you haven’t heard by now, this year is a US Congressional midterm election year meaning that eligible American citizens will be voting for their local representative and 1/3 of the states will be selecting their senator. But perhaps because yesterday was Mother’s Day in the States, the New York Times ran a front-page, above-the-fold piece on the number of…
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The Short Arc of Pub Trivia Scores Bends Towards Victory
Read on…: The Short Arc of Pub Trivia Scores Bends Towards VictoryWell, at least over the last three weeks it did. In previous examples of my pub trivia team’s performance, we have had a lacklustre performance. But a few weeks we had an epic collapse. Having been in 4th place out of 10 in the penultimate round we ultimately finished in 8th out of 9—somebody left early—and 14 points out of…
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Kilauea Eruption
Read on…: Kilauea EruptionAs a kid, volcanoes fascinated me. The idea that the molten core of the Earth can bubble its way up to and then erupt from the cold crusty surface of the planet still fascinates me. Of course, volcanoes can also have drastic impacts on people, both at the grand scale of impacting global climate to the smaller and more personal…
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Albert Pujols Isn’t Too Bad at That Baseball Thing
Read on…: Albert Pujols Isn’t Too Bad at That Baseball ThingOn Friday Albert Pujols joined the very elite club of baseball players who have managed 3000 hits in their career. Thankfully FiveThirtyEight covered it with a few graphics in an article that pointed out just how hard it is to do. Especially because, and I did not know this, Pujols did it in a not terribly common fashion. (Funny story,…