Ch.9Designing with Purpose
When you explore your own data, you don't need to do much in terms of storytelling. You are, after all, the storyteller, so you probably don't need to narrate to yourself. However, the moment you use visualization to present information—whether it's to one person, several thousand, or millions—a stand-alone chart is no longer good enough.
Sure, you want others to interpret results and perhaps form their own stories, but it's hard for readers to know what questions to ask when they don't know anything about the data in front of them. It's your responsibility to set the stage. Think about who and what your visualization is for and design with the purpose in mind.
GOOD VISUALIZATION
Although people have been visualizing data for centuries, only in the past few decades have researchers been studying what works and what doesn't. In that respect, visualization is a relatively new field. For a while, there was no consensus on what visualization actually is. Is it an analysis tool? Is it a form of communication? Is it art? Those who believed visualization was one thing would disagree with others who felt visualization was another thing because a chart that is good for communication might not be good for analysis, and vice versa.
However, visualization is not a single thing with a single set of rules and standards. Visualization is a medium that can serve different purposes.
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