Visualize this! Collaborative data visualization

It’s strange that we live in a data driven world, however, most people have a desperately limited knowledge of how to analyze data and understand what the information actually means. On a daily basis we are always hearing news reports about this study or that study, but only the most simplified dumbed down data and charts are ever presented to the viewers.

Data junkies like myself now have a nifty new data visualization tool at our disposal. Many Eyes from IBM is a community driven website for creating and sharing visualizations of data. Users can create visualizations with a host of graph types to choose from. There is everything from the good ol’ bar graph and line graph to scatter plots, bubble chart, matrix diagrams, and many more.

Some of you may be interested to see maps depicting the extent of the subprime crisis.

Others will be interested to see the topic hub on global warming.

Critiques can be hashed out in the comments section that is attached to each visualization, and of course users can introduce their own improved and updated visualizations.

I’m off to create my first visualization. Enjoy.