Reader James H. spotted this offensive pie chart in Forbes (link). This chart tells us that emerging markets will be responsible for the greatest growth in medical spending up to 2016. It is hard to find this message in the...
Reader James H. spotted this offensive pie chart in Forbes (link). This chart tells us that emerging markets will be responsible for the greatest growth in medical spending up to 2016. It is hard to find this message in the...
Reader Julien D. sent in this image, which apparently has been in circulation. This company has a whole series of these ads running.
This WSJ book review on "The Tyranny of Algorithms" (link) is well worth reading for those interested in how computer algorithms are used in business and government. I agree with most of what this author has to say. There is an elephant in the room whenever it comes to discussing computer algorithms, particularly highly automated ones. Almost all such algorithms are inaccurate. They are inaccurate for many reasons, the most…
This WSJ graphic gives me a reason to talk about the self-sufficiency test: go ahead, and block out the data labels on the chart, you are left with concentric circles but no way to learn anything from the chart, not...
The recent articles proclaiming the death of organic foods could as well be written by big agribusinesses. The reporting raises a whole bunch of questions. Here's the NYT on the study (link) and here's Time (link). Here are some points to ponder: 1. There is no new research. Time's headline gets this wrong even though in the article itself, the author says the research is a review of existing studies…
I was a guest on the Analytically Speaking series, organized by JMP. In this webcast (link, registration required), I talk about the coexistence of data science and statistics, why my blog is called "Junk Charts", what I look for in an analy...
I highly recommend the soon-to-appear book, Networked Life: 20 Questions and Answers by Mung Chiang (pre-order at Amazon) for anyone who wants to know more about the technologies -- technical philosophies, in some cases -- underlying the businesses of high-tech superstars like mobile phone companies, Google, Netflix, Amazon, Wikipedia, Skype, and so on. If you like Wired magazine but want a bit more meat, and are not intimidated by a…
Ezra Klein (link) cited a particularly revealing graphic from the Hamilton Project. And I found this via Washington's blog (link). The gist of the story is that most reports citing median annual earnings of US workers fail to disclose a severe selection bias: the number reflects the median of full-time wage earners. The number cited is the black line in the chart to the left. The more realistic number is…
There is a stimulating conversation going on between Cathy O'Neil (mathbabe) and CMU Prof. Cosma Shalizi about whether "data science" is different from "statistics". Cathy started by posting some comments about "how to hire data scientists" (link). Cosma responded with white is the new black (link): a "modern" statistics undergraduate training would prepare one well for such jobs. Cathy disagreed on several fronts, favoring PhD training (to be able to…
An email lay in my inbox with the tantalizing subject line: "How to Create Good Infographics Quickly and Cheaply?" It's a half-spam from one of the marketing sites that I signed up for long time ago. I clicked on the...
