Seeing Data

Here's a site you might enjoy - http://infosthetics.com/. The whole idea behind it is the visualization of data.

Naturally, we've done this  - visualized data - for a long time. I can remember tests in school that asked for an interpretation of a graph. What did the correlation of the X-Y data tell us?

Now, with the combination of the computer (able to compute huge quantities of data in the blink of an eye, including 3-dimensional data), plus the Internet (massive amounts of data procured from actual behavior, making it even more reliable than the old "sampling" of information we used to rely on), plus ever more inventive ways to "see" this data (like, heat maps, that tell us by varying colors or three-d peaks and valleys) how data is distributed, the visualization of data has become a true blending of art and science.

Think of the old topographical map, for example. It showed, via the distance between lines, or shapes drawn on a map, the relative height of the land formations. The closer the lines are together, the higher (and steeper) the elevation. Or, if you look at a thermographic representation of brain activity - higher activity registers as red on a brain scan, lower activity tends towards the blues.

This website uses data of all kinds and then artists (I can think of no better word for them!) invent stunning ways of representing this data in any number of startling and informative ways. A recent example is using music to create "audio flowers." " Audio Flowers [last.fm] is the result of extensive research conducted at Last.fm into new techniques to measure structural change (or "complexity") in rhythm, harmony and timbre directly from MP3 files.

"The aim of these little summary visualizations is to allow people to get a better overview of the complexity of individual music tracks. Currently, the audio of about 17,000 tracks have been analyzed and visualized in this way. However, to assure they are on the right track, the developers are requesting volunteers to compare pairs of music tracks to check the accuracy of these flower depictions with the actual human perception."

My only gripe with this one is that the songs  - the flowers - are not labeled! At least, not on the sample shown on the site.

Still, the art/science is in its infancy, and I can only imagine how we will eventually be able to convey data as more an more analysts try their hand at creative expressions of information.

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