The Social in the Visual

Data Underload posts can be found on Nathan Yau’s Flowing Data blog, which is a must see. This design is one of his I believe. When not making his own engaging pieces, he certainly has an eye for others’ entertaining infographics. We’re very keen on these kinds of nonsense infographics just because of what they can tell us about engaging and entertaining while (mis)informing. Our raison d’etre is accessibility you may recall. The link, Data Underload , was sent to us courtesy of Andy Simionato of Thisisamagazine fame, whose acquaintance I am very pleased to have made recently. Keep ‘em coming, Andy. hopefully, we can coax Andy to work with us on some of our experiments.
Testing … testing … Are we back on air? The title of this post does two jobs. We’re also back after a long hiatus during which we’ve each been flat out on our own projects but have been underloading the data on Figures. Uriah and myself are determined to continue Figures and will shortly relaunch it in Uriah’s fab new livery. Hopefully, we’ll be joined by Scott Savage our colleague in Dunedin, NZ who shares our interests in this field. Anyway, we promise to start the posts back up and prompt you, dear reader, for your valued feedback.

Here are a couple of the postcards in close-up. We had some interesting comments about these in particular when we presented the concept at a recent conference in Adelaide. The idea of creating a news article as a book of postcards seemed to go over well. We had the added notion of turning the book stub into a flick-book once the postcards are removed. Senseless wastage seemed inappropriate especially in a discussion about energy use.
In our pursuit of ‘accessability’ here at Figures, we have kept the graphics clear and crisp. However, on the back of each of the cards is an ironic statement that may be a little more obscure. For example, “Haven’t you heard we are in the middle of a ‘BOOM’?” We hope these work a little like news ’soundbites’ but prompt people into thinking about where they live and what their lifestyle requires in terms of energy.

Here are some of the postcards which you will be able to see in following posts. In all there are ten in the set. We hope that the use of postcards will refer to the relaxed lifestyle that we often take for granted in Western Australia, but that the kinds of graphics we have put on the cards will not necessarily put the reader in a holiday mood!

On the subject of incongruous contexts and odd juxtaposition, we’d love your input on just where these postcards could be found. We’ve been thinking places of relaxation and conversation such as cafés. What are your thoughts?

Here is the first concrete output of Figures. On 3 June 2008 an explosion occurred on Western Australia’s Varanus Island which cut off a major gas supply for the state for many weeks. While the explosion was remote from any major centres in the state, its effects are still being felt by industry and, as a consequence, by individuals employed or laid off by those industries, and the families of those individuals. The news media has concentrated on the state government’s over reliance on one main supply but has not effectively described how the explosion has led to the loss of hundreds of jobs.

We chose this story as our first test-case at Figures. Our own Uriah Mathews developed the illustrations after many days of painstaking research to find reliable sources of data on gas use in Western Australia. To emphasise the locative aspects of the story (connections to the celebrated WA lifestyle, and so on) and to invite interaction with the public. We decided that a book of postcards, which direct contributors to this website, would be an appropriate medium for the message.

The fallout from this explosion continues to drift across the state’s political landscape. The story continues: can you help us piece it together by adding your own contribution and/or by commenting on our approach?