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NPR recently sat down with the visualization guru Edward Tufte to discuss his sculptures (You knew he was a grand-scale sculptor, right?) on the announcement of his new gallery in New York City’s Art district, and eventually the conversation moves towards his work with Recovery.gov.

“I’m working on things where people can see immediately the 100 biggest projects, the 100 smallest projects, the 100 biggest medical projects, the 100 smallest medical projects,” he says. “So it’s a way of — in one click — of getting down to the material. And also you can put your zip code in and see the projects.”

When asked if his work with the government and with information design has any overlap with his art, Tufte says he does see a commonality. In the end, he wants to try and leave things that are forever — and that “make people see a little differently.”

via The Many Faces (And Sculptures) Of Edward Tufte : NPR.

Science government, interview, tufte

If you’re a fan of Edward Tufte and just happen to be lounging in London tomorrow evening, then you should consider picking up tickets to his talk at the Royal Geographical Society.  But alas, it’s all sold out. However, all is not lost thanks to the organizers and Information Is Beautiful:

Lord of information design, Edward Tufte is making a rare appearance in London this Wednesday (19th May)

It sold out months ago. But we’ve got two complimentary tickets to give away, thanks to the generous organisers, IntelligenceSquared.com.

To enter, just email tufteisbeautiful@gmail.com

If you can’t make it (or don’t win), don’t fret as you can still check out a webcast of the event (live or afterwards) for a mere 2.99 £ .

Win Tickets To See Edward Tufte In London.

Science contest, tufte

Juice Analytics has a great writeup of Edward Tufte’s “Small Multiples” concept, using many small iconic visualizations to replace large overly complex ones.

Small multiples can show rich, multi-dimensional data without trying to cram all that information into a single, overly-complex chart. Small multiples go by many names, including Trellis Chart, Lattice Chart, Grid Chart, and Panel Chart. I would even argue that sparklines are a simpler, smaller cousin of small multiples

Along the way he shows many examples and references from the likes of Many Eyes, Stephen Few, and Tableau.  Definitely worth a read;

via Better Know a Visualization: Small Multiples: Juice Analytics.

Science stephen few, tufte

Recently we told you about Edward Tufte being appointed to be an adviser to the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board. We have recently run across two articles that have been posted talking about Edward Tufte. First up, the New York Times talks to Tufte about his appointment:

“Political practice today too often skips right by evidence,” he said by e-mail. “When I listen to True Believers (left or right) talk about the problems that governments are seeking to solve, I keep muttering to myself, ‘How boring, it’s more complicated than that.’ And those who best know that it’s more complicated than that are public servants.”

The second article is an interview of Edward Tufte from On the Media (NPR):

BOB GARFIELD: The data among different agencies doesn’t necessarily conform. They have different ways of measuring appropriations and expenditures, and it’s really hard to get a fix. There’s not only apples and oranges, but there’s grapefruits and strawberries and kumquats out there. What’s a graphics guru to do?

EDWARD TUFTE: Probably the first thing that most people do when they go to the website is they type in their zip code, and up pops up all the stimulus projects in their area. And what’s interesting about this, it’s a huge database and the particular viewer has no interest in 99 percent of it, but via the zip code they can make it special for them, as can everybody else.

via Link by Link – Advising Recovery Board on Offering Clear Data – NYTimes.com.

via : Minister of Information

Science arra, government, tufte

Visualization Guru Edward Tufte has received the honor (some would say curse) of being on President Obama’s Recovery Independent Advisory Panel. If you haven’t heard of it:

“The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board was created by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 with two goals:

• To provide transparency in relation to the use of Recovery-related funds.
• To prevent and detect fraud, waste, and mismanagement.

Earl E. Devaney was appointed by President Obama to serve as chairman of the Recovery Board. Twelve Inspectors General from various federal agencies serve with Chairman Devaney. The Board issues quarterly and annual reports to the President and Congress and, if necessary, “flash reports” on matters that require immediate attention. In addition, the Board maintains the Recovery.gov website so the American people can see how Recovery money is being distributed by federal agencies and how the funds are being used by the recipients.

Mission statement: To promote accountability by coordinating and conducting oversight of Recovery funds to prevent fraud, waste, and abuse and to foster transparency on Recovery spending by providing the public with accurate, user-friendly information.”

On his site, Tufte’s response:

I’m doing this because I like accountability and transparency, and I believe in public service. And it is the complete opposite of everything else I do. Maybe I’ll learn something. The practical consequence is that I will probably go to Washington several days each month, in addition to whatever homework and phone meetings are necessary.

Congratulations to Edward Tufte!  Glad to have a true expert in the field up in Washington, although only time will tell if he actually has any power to effect change.

via Ask E.T.: Edward Tufte Presidential Appointment.

Science arra, government, tufte

A new patent application (hasn’t been awarded yet, I believe) from Microsoft bears stark resemblence (in both form and name) to Edward Tufte’s Sparklines.  I don’t think anyone would doubt that Tufte created the popular visualization algorithm, however the inventor list completely excludes him:

Radakovitz, Samuel Chow (Redmond, WA, US) Buerman, Adam Michael (Bellevue, WA, US) Garg, Anupam (Redmond, WA, US) Androski, Matthew John (Bellevue, WA, US) Becker, Matthew Kevin (Kirkland, WA, US) Ruble, Brian S. (Bellevue, WA, US)

Meant to be included in Microsoft Excel as a new charting method, it’s left many wondering what recourse Tufte has (aside from claiming prior art).  Tufte is himself entertaining ideas on his forum.

What do you think?

Sparklines for Excel: United States Patent Application 20090282325.

Science microsoft, patent, sparklines, tufte

At the Edward Tufte Lecture Tour stop that Maitri Erwin attended, and kindly wrote up for us here, she received four of his most popular books on data visualization and infographics (included in the registration cost).  For your reference, the four books were:

For a full list of Edward Tufte’s texts, you can look at Edward Tufte Amazon Page..

Science books, feature, tufte

Stamen Design is the talk of the geospatial design world.  Each offering is smart: minimalist yet visually pleasing, multi-variate and ready for analysis.  Flowing Data, no stranger to fine infographics themselves, recently featured Stamen’s California Stimulus Funding Map with high praise: “It’s slick as hell.”  This is what good information design gets you.  And, as far as academic memory serves, the revolution in modern information design started with a man named Edward Tufte.

Tufte, or ET as he prefers it, possesses an invaluable combination of talents that he draws from and to our collective benefit as visualization workers: an eye for art, thorough knowledge of content, design prowess, discipline, a desire to share and the energy for successive public speaking engagements in which he preaches his gospel.  I met up with ET after one such lecture in Cincinnati on August 25th, at which time he was kind enough to participate in an audio interview that sits at the end of this post.

Read the rest of Maitri’s article & hear the interview after the break.

Read more…

Graphics, Podcast, Science feature, interview, Podcast, tufte

Don’t forget, Maitri Erwin’s interview with Edward Tufte is tonight, so if you have ideas for questions or discussion then get them in now before it’s too late!

Upcoming VizWorld Interview With Edward Tufte | VizWorld.com.

Science feature, interview, tufte

Edward Tufte has long hated pie-charts, for both their aesthetic failings and misleading representations of visual data.  Neal Levene backs up the argument with a new post on Simple Complexity that quite simply shows that Pie Charts are just plain harder to deal with than their counterparts.

Can you rank the size of the wedges from largest to smallest? Take a second to write down your answer. (We will reveal the answer later in the article.) When you are finished, click to the next page of this post.

via Effectiveness of Chart Design — InnovaTech, Inc.’s Simple Complexity.

Science piechart, tufte, visualization