We need to develop a platform where we can quickly and easily set up a site to track data, events and feelings on any issue. This platform could act as a sort of social conscience for a group.

Not to get too political but most recently I have been pondering the Cash for Clunkers program. While I applaud attempts at lowering emissions and oil consumption I can’t help but have some serious reservations. It’s the prefect example for this I want to know more than how much is being spent by the government. I want to know how much overall mileage has been reduced and what the energy and resource use is for disposing of the old cars, also are there any resulting changes in the production of new cars? I want to know how many of the clunkers were serviceable, how old were they on average, has this worked elsewhere? I want to know what we think of the program as a country. In summary I want all this data and more available for me to decide whether or not it was worth it and if we should renew it, say, for a third time.

Such a platform could be applied to any issue you could think of Detention of Guantanamo Detainees to your bowling team’s uniform. This could help us to make better decisions as a society (or bowling team), preventing us from repeating mistakes (or someone else)by clearly aggregating the decisions and their effects. It just needs to be built.

One more post in what is turning into an all out love fest for Google. Google say it can track progress and spread of the flu through people’s searches in the interwebs. Whats more impressive is that they can compile this data and predict where the flu will hit next.

The premise behind Google Flu Trends — what appears to be a fruitful marriage of mob behavior and medicine — has been validated by an unrelated study indicating that the data collected by Yahoo, Google’s main rival in Internet search, can also help with early detection of the flu. – Miguel Helft New York TImes

Head on over to Google Flu.

Ever four years (yes I know they’ll start on the new one in about a week) elections enter our lives bringing with them many things including constant tv, radio, newspaper ads and bitter family debates. Most of the election baggage is annoying but for designers there is one huge bonus, a slew of beautiful well thought out infographics. Oh beautiful infographics, ever need inspiration?, look no further. These sets of complex and dense sets of data are beautiful when done well and nauseating when not. The rise of the interactivity of the web has the ability to take infographics to eleven. While the presidential election is finally the graphics are still being pumped out for retrospective views or ongoing races/recounts (someday MN will have a senator). Below is a list of nice graphics I’ve come across this time around.

New York Times: Always a source of inspiration they’ve had some particularily good ones this year.

New York Times Election Results Page

Obama Speech, McCain Speech

Electoral Shifts

Milestones of Barack Obama

Milestone of John McCain

Dissecting the Changing Electorate

you can go here for more from the New York Times

Washington Post:

this one is really detailed Election Winners by County

Good: While not always non-partisan their graphics are always good.

The First 100 Days: Time line of the first 100 days of every president since FDR.

Voters Guide

It’s the Economy, Stupid!

Again this is just a short list of the good info design that we’ve been treated to. if you know of others post them in the comments to share with all. Here’s to the next four years.

Jonathan Harris is a story teller. In the tradition of the best story tellers he uncovers glimpses of life, and allows you to reconstruct the rest. You can hear him speak about his work at TED Dec 2007 here or here. His now old project We Feel Fine or his more recent The Whale Hunt are beautiful examples of information design. The different ways in which he handles data, whether it is the data points emulating the weather or using metadata to create a timeline, are both engaging and beautiful.

But while inspiring, this is not the most important lesson of his work. The important aspect of his work is the reminder that good information design goes farther than aesthetics and readability. Good information design engages it’s audience with a story.