Virtual Pizza Pie Chart - High Tech Chartjunk
Another anti-pattern we should consider relates to how we use
visualizations or present charts.
Edward Tufte calls the clutter that often obscures charts or
visualizations chartjunk.
Usually it's meaningless colors or styles that hinder rather than help
clarify the actual meaning of the chart. But what happens when
chartjunk meets high-tech? It gets even more useless. During the CNN
coverage for the Iowa Caucus, Anderson Cooper introduced "The Magic
Pie Chart". This has got to be one of the silliest abuses of
technology I have seen in a long, long time. I can't wait to see what
the networks come up with for the 2008 General Election.
What I love is how the technology completely takes over. It pops out
and looks like it could hurt someone. Then it obscures the rest of the
panelists. And finally Anderson is so enamored with trying to keep it
from bursting again that he is using all his brain cycles to keep the
3D virtual pie chart on that silly piece of cardboard.
Here is a more traditional example of chartjunk from Tufte's site.
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