Jeff Jenkins writes:
I read your blog and I thought you might be interested in this. He explains why it’s terrible about half way down.
It really is bad. I can’t bear to reproduce it here.
Jeff Jenkins writes:
I read your blog and I thought you might be interested in this. He explains why it’s terrible about half way down.
It really is bad. I can’t bear to reproduce it here.
It was reported to be from a 'draft' report and was subsequently corrected.
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2009/01/22/51558/…
It's worth a look, but note that the "error" is not agreed on. The error is to use the radius of the circle to represent the number, whereas any idiot would know you need to use the area.
But note even expert opinion varies on this point. Kaiser Fung of the JunkCharts blog noted to my surprise:
"some readers will respond to the areas while others will respond to radii. ZBicyclist, for example, belongs to the first group while in this case, I find myself siding with the latter. When the bubbles/rings overlap, it is difficult to assess areas."
http://junkcharts.typepad.com/junk_charts/2008/12…
(although Kaiser is commenting on a different bubble chart, and has criticized the chart in question here)