Monday
Mar222010
: edward tufte - minister of information
Monday, March 22, 2010 at 05:31AM
I would imagine that most people coming to this post/site would not need any introduction on Edward Tufte. Visit that link if you do need one, or listen below for a great interview aired on the radio program On The Media this weekend from NPR.
Tufte continues his crusade for efficient, clean, and rich display of information. Those familiar with him, his books, and seminars know the spiel. I especially love this - he claims that the human eye-to-brain system is so powerful that in a one second glance, 120 megabits of information is processed by our brain. There is no reason to clog that process up or hinder it in any way with meaningless junk. That's an important principal to remember when designing interfaces. Not always possible or even advisable when designing marketing or brand experiences, but that is a debate to be had at some other point.
This time, Tufte has been brought on by the Obama administration to help design Recovery.gov. The White House appointed him to make sure the government can clearly communicate where all our money is going. The site is still a work in progress, but it does fill me with confidence knowing that someone cares this much about it.
The site has a nice clean look, but it is a bit cluttered at this point. Maybe a redesign is in the works? In the meantime search by zip code for information on how stimulus money is being spent in your community. Pretty cool to be able to track this kind of thing. Typically, you just imagine our tax dollars going to 500 dollar toilet seat covers for the pentagon. Seems to be real accountability at work here. Imagine if we had this type of thing to track where our money went in invasion of Iraq? I believe there are still $12 billion in cash unaccounted for.
visit - http://www.recovery.gov/Pages/home.aspx
Tufte continues his crusade for efficient, clean, and rich display of information. Those familiar with him, his books, and seminars know the spiel. I especially love this - he claims that the human eye-to-brain system is so powerful that in a one second glance, 120 megabits of information is processed by our brain. There is no reason to clog that process up or hinder it in any way with meaningless junk. That's an important principal to remember when designing interfaces. Not always possible or even advisable when designing marketing or brand experiences, but that is a debate to be had at some other point.
This time, Tufte has been brought on by the Obama administration to help design Recovery.gov. The White House appointed him to make sure the government can clearly communicate where all our money is going. The site is still a work in progress, but it does fill me with confidence knowing that someone cares this much about it.
The site has a nice clean look, but it is a bit cluttered at this point. Maybe a redesign is in the works? In the meantime search by zip code for information on how stimulus money is being spent in your community. Pretty cool to be able to track this kind of thing. Typically, you just imagine our tax dollars going to 500 dollar toilet seat covers for the pentagon. Seems to be real accountability at work here. Imagine if we had this type of thing to track where our money went in invasion of Iraq? I believe there are still $12 billion in cash unaccounted for.
visit - http://www.recovery.gov/Pages/home.aspx
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