1. Lying Through Visualization?

An interesting bit of infoviz ethics here. AT&T is suing Verizon over a commercial which features a map comparing the two companies' 3G wireless coverage.

AT&T alleges that although the data may be accurate, the presentation is misleading. According to the complaint, although the map compares only 3G coverage (which Verizon has more of), the blank spacing in the map suggests that AT&T has no coverage of any kind in those areas.

I'm fairly certain legal action is the wrong play here. It only seems to validate Verizon's claims that AT&T is inferior. The map may be correct, but the message is not. AT&T has data coverage in those "blank" areas, just not 3G. AT&T should turn around and make an ad with a map comparing where iPhones work. Plenty of blank space for Verizon there.

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Last week, some of you may have read about Nike's Chalkbot campaign at the Tour de France. The campaign deployed what was basically a giant chalkjet printer attached to the back of a truck to promote cancer awareness, Lance Armstrong's Livestrong foundation, and itself (of course not necessarily in that order).

Image via.

Not long after the unveiling, a representative from the Institute for Applied Autonomy informed the nettime mailing list that Chalkbot bore a remarkable resemblance to the same's GraffitiWriter project.

Here is an excerpt:

Since 1998, the Institute for Applied Autonomy has been inventing and building robots to protest the militarization of robotics research and to reassert the public's ownership of public space. Among the machines we produced were GraffitiWriter, a small remote controlled robot capable of printing high-speed text graffiti on the pavement while driving...

In pointing out that the Nike Chalkbot is a higher-resolution/higher-budget but otherwise obvious descendent [sic] of the StreetWriter (SWX), we do not claim any sort of ownership over the project or the idea...we have long expected our anti-corporate project to one day be reappropriated as an advertising scheme...

I thought that the Near Future Laboratory put it well: "Something definitely happens when a concept dips into the world of corporate sponsorship -- it's authenticity and the trust behind the principles begins to dissipate quite rapidly. It becomes bland eyeball candy, is all."

Developed by 2D Boy, a two-person team, World of Goo is a puzzle game with a simple mechanic—assembling minimal physics-simulated structures so your Goo-balls can exit the level, Lemmings-style. More than this, it has great production values (made with open source software!) and a lot of heart. If you’re in need of some fun, we encourage you to check out the demo.

Don’t just take our word for it. The critics totally dig the full game.

When you’re ready to take the plunge, you can purchase it on Steam (which we also like), or from WiiWare. ((I may go the Wii route over Christmas because I like waggle controls and it seems to be a bit more reasonably priced than the PC version ($15 vs. $20)))

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We’ve been talking this week about the little things in design, those small pieces that must come together to create the big experience. When they go AWOL, customers get frustrated. As I wrote on Tuesday, no hardware; no bookshelf.

Yesterday, Paul mentioned a few things designers could do to prevent or mitigate the damage from missing parts. In today’s post, I want to draw attention to his second white-hat solution: using standardized parts in designs.

There are a lot of non-standard parts floating around today’s designs: strange battery types; odd Scandinavian screws; hacky code. These may allow the designer more freedom (or just make their job easier), but they take freedom away from the end-user.

If a customer can’t wait for the company to respond with a missing part, they should be able to go to the store and quickly get a replacement. Whenever possible, using standardized parts instead of that 15/16″ septagonal bolt is bound to save the day even when your company can’t.

But standards alone aren’t enough. It is possible to use standardized pieces that customers can’t understand and/or easily replace at the store. I’m talking about proprietary standards.

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