Jumping Fox

Ping and prod

David McCandless is justifiably famous for his work at Information is Beautiful but as his bio on the TED website says, his “genius is not so much in finding jazzy new ways to show data [...] but in finding fresh ways to combine datasets to let them ping and prod each other.”

With free tools such as Many Eyes and Tableau it’s becoming easier and easier to visualise data (though making it look beautiful is another matter).

The real challenge now is in finding and curating data to tell a new, compelling story.

Skimming goes live

An interesting take on skimming and browsing behaviours online, the Times Skimmer is now live on the main New York Times website. In the final release they’ve added the typeface Cheltenham—familiar to readers of their print edition—to the app using Typekit along with sponsorship from Blackberry, adding the commercial aspect noticeably absent in the test version I wrote about earlier. It’s a polished evolution of the idea, very well executed.

Serious, not solemn

“Great design is serious (not solemn),” says Paula Scher, a New York based partner at design firm Pentagram. She argues that you do your best work when you’re having fun, exploring and not pressured by expectations.

I find the key is finding somewhere in between: creative work needs a combination of space and freedom but also a clear problem to solve.

Need more Paula Scher? Hillman Curtis has a video discussing type as image that’s also worth watching.