The thing I love about the net is unfortunately the thing I also dislike about it. You can meet people online from all around the world but at the same time you don’t often get to meet them face to face without great expense. Last week was different when I travelled to Perth, I met some great customers, giving me a chance to put faces to weblogs and avatars. [Read more...]

Phil over at Vincenze’s pit points out the potential pitfalls of pie charts. His conclusion:

So the next time you’re preparing a presentation, stop and ask yourself; what message am I sending my viewers when I use a pie chart? Ultimately, the one thing you can be certain of is that it won’t be a clear one.

Check out his post for a really clear example of why they’re problematic.

Garr Reynolds looks at some alternative ways to present data, including a brief discussion on the pros and cons of pie charts, when reviewing a presentation by Whole Foods Market’s CEO, John Mackey.

While we’re on the topic of data visualisation (incl. charting), I’ve come across a few related links recently:

• Tufte charts in Excel
• Excel “in cell” graphing – a clever method of visualising data on a cell-by-cell basis (check out the screenshots in the article to see what I’m trying to say…)

And lastly – Seth Godin has had a thing about bad PowerPoint for a while. Now he has found some research to back it up.

Update: Oh – I forgot this one: Periodic Table of Visualisation Methods.