Presented with a chart, I would guess that most people share a similar first response, something along the lines of Okay, now what? The chart below, for example, is not particularly complicated but it, like most charts, is trying to convey some numerical information visually. Like an emoji for math.
Wp Get the full experience.Choose your plan ArrowRight
Of course, the extent to which that information is conveyed varies, right? Some charts are totally inscrutable. Some are hopelessly complex. Some are wonderfully elegant. Some are dumb. In each of those cases, a closer examination can be rewarding — figuring out what it’s supposed to say, or how it could be better or what additional information is offered. Maybe charts are more like crossword puzzles in that sense. Or like art? Or like, uh, symphonies? Look, I’m trying to sell you on something, so just imagine charts are analogous to whatever at-times-complex thing you find appealing.
Sign up for How To Read This Chart, a weekly newsletter from Philip Bump
Here is what I propose: a weekly newsletter in which we elevate each of those kinds of data visualizations. In How To Read This Chart, we’ll consider good charts, parse complex ones and discuss how bad ones might be improved. We’ll look at ways in which information might be conveyed more effectively with lines than words. Analyses of pop culture, politics, economics — anything where there’s a number in the news. I’ve done this for a while, having worked as a designer at the software company Adobe and spending years translating data from the news into visuals, so I’m confident in serving as your tour guide.
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
So on Saturday you open your email and there's a welcome message from The Washington Post. Maybe it's a terrific visualization I found somewhere in the news or a pretty good one that I made for an article. Perhaps it's one I stumbled upon that isn't that great and worth assessing (which also could be one I made). Maybe it's one you found and sent me. At times we'll explore how best to present data, including data you send in. Like an advice column for data presentation, perhaps excluding most of the usual presumptuousness.
Sign up for How To Read This Chart, a weekly newsletter from Philip Bump
The idea here is not that you need to be a data obsessive or a graphic designer. Quite the opposite. The idea instead is that charts are interesting and offer a unique lens on the world. I find charts and visualizations fascinating, and I hope to convey that even to those who at first may not.
So let’s practice with the chart above: my approximation of how you’ve felt as you’ve read this article — which I know you have, since you’re reading this now. One point of feedback I’d offer myself (having created it) is that using “bemused” instead of “confused” is probably overly cute for the sake of clarity, but, again, sometimes complexity is its own reward. The important value, of course is that fourth one, the likelihood of signing up which, here in the six paragraph, has reached its apex.
Sign up for How To Read This Chart, a weekly newsletter from Philip Bump
And then I for some reason added a seventh paragraph, lowering that likelihood and increasing the confusion, but I had no choice since that’s what the chart said. See you on Saturday morning.