Comments on: Trends to Watch in 2006 - Part 3

By: WHOLLYDEV | 2006 trends and web apps failure

WHOLLYDEV | 2006 trends and web apps failure — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 20:33:24 +0000

[...] Trends to Watch in 2006 Trends to Watch in 2006 - Part 2 Trends to Watch in 2006 - Part 3 [...]

By: Doug Marttila

Doug Marttila — Wed, 18 Jan 2006 16:57:29 +0000

I just discovered yet another technical change that should help info viz this year (agreed Mike - not huge but gradual but still a move). Structured blogging. I just made my first structured post (an “event” - using WordPress plug in) and was pretty psyched to check out the xml in there. Not sure how to aggregate it yet - but, that data (time stamps, addresses) can definately be visualized.

By: Michal Migurski

Michal Migurski — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 17:45:50 +0000

A year late, or maybe a perpetual five-to-ten years early?

I think Information Visualization is similar to the recently funny-popular Bill Gates computer speech predictions. The wave keeps threatening to break, but never seems to quite gather the necessary momentum. Meanwhile, designers continue to do interesting work in the trenches, interfaces slowly grow new visual displays of information, and software users keep raising their expectations of charts, graphs and UI’s. I think this is one trend that’s never going to feel “huge” (in the way that one of Tim’s other trendspottings, Ruby On Rails, did), even while continuing to expand dramatically.

My personal prediction for infoviz in 2006 is that there will be a shift from Tufte-style static information displays to live ones, that show data in flux or afford manipulation. Developments like AP’s Measure Map date widget or open-source libraries for generating well-understood display styles will drive this change by helping non-designers get in on the action. It will be some time (2-3 years) before a designer or researcher blesses this shift with a book on dynamic information visualization that rivals Tufte’s in elegance and reach.

My other prediction is that Stamen will continue KICK ASS in this area. ;o)

By: Brian Schneeberg

Brian Schneeberg — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 12:18:07 +0000

Information visualization geared towards consumers is the problem we are working on at Grimaldi Productions. We have a beta of our flagship product, Mentations, available for download. I’d love to get your feedback on it! (hint: right-click on things for options)

By: Doug Marttila

Doug Marttila — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 04:39:21 +0000

It’s definitely the year (at least I hope so). A few other reasons…
1. Public APIs - finally there’s data to visualize.
2. Folksonomies - people are more involved in data creation. The more you know and own the data, the more you want to use and visualize it.
3. Ajax - widely adopted/accepted over the last six months to a year. It’s made the web richer and more usable. That should make people expect, or at least be more open to, more complex visualizations.

By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 02:25:42 +0000

So was Tim a year early or am I a year late?

Or is neither 2005 nor 2006 the year for infoviz?

By: Michal Migurski

Michal Migurski — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 01:12:34 +0000

Information Visualization was also one of Tim O’Reilly’s trends to watch in 2005, along with Ruby On Rails and a third thing I can’t remember.