hen in the early 90’s, hipsters of that time decided that graphs weren’t cool enough, and called them charts. On an unrelated note, charts started being printed on regular printers, and boredom killed millions of interns. Then in the mid-00’s, the art of plotting/graphing/charting data was re-named… data visualization. The course of mankind was changed forever, or at least for the next decade. On the same unrelated note, as data visualizations went online, surfing the web dramatically decreased the interns mortality rate.So here it is: ‘data visualization’ is the new cool name for ‘chart’. And that’s what we do at qunb: we help people tell compelling stories with their own data by instantly letting them create simple, meaningful, interactive charts.But in the early 10’s, infographics emerged, and the man in the street started getting confused: “Well, he said, is infographics the new new new name for charts”?

via Why We Hate Infographics And Why You Should.

Millennial males in the US have earned a reputation as laggards. But that’s not how today’s young men regard themselves, according to a new eMarketer report, “Taking the Measure of Millennial Men: As Sort-of-Grownups, as Digital Users, as Consumers.”

via Millennial Men Keep Their Digital Lives Humming – eMarketer.

In practice, design is a process that should happen with content, not just for it, and the practice of creating a page full of lorem ipsum and getting the copywriter to fill in the blanks just doesn’t cut it anymore. The cross-discipline approach of using design as a way to clearly communicate information, known as communication design, is growing. However, no matter how clearly laid out a design is or how elegant the infographics are, our number one visual tool for relaying information to the audience is well-written text.

via Designing The Words: Why Copy Is A Design Issue | Smashing Magazine.

In research published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, researchers found that they could predict people’s Facebook use by looking at how their brain reacted to positive social feedback in a scanner: Specifically, a region called the nucleus accumbens, which processes rewarding feelings about food, sex, money and social acceptance became more active in response to praise for oneself compared to praise of others. And that activation was associated with more time on the social media site

via What Happens In Your Brain When People Like Your Facebook Status.

Ipsos-Social-Sharing-Motivations-Sept2013Why do social media users share content? That was the question posed to consumers around the world in a recent survey by Ipsos Open Thinking Exchange (OTX). Among American respondents who had shared content on social media sites during the previous month, a leading 65% said they typically look to share “interesting things.” While fewer (49%) said they typically seek to share “funny things,” Americans appear to be more motivated to share “funny” than “important” content (43%).

via Americans More Likely to Share “Funny” Than “Important” Content on Social Media.

Econsultancy-Main-Objectives-for-Paid-Digital-Media-Sept2013More companies cite lead generation 37% than branding 27% as their main social media advertising objective, according to [download page] a new study from Econsultancy in association with Adobe. The survey – of company marketers around the world, but primarily from Europe – indicates that fewer respondents are looking to increase traffic 18% or drive direct online sales 18% from their social media advertising efforts.

via Global Marketers Say Lead Gen A Bigger Social Ad Objective Than Branding.

But this picture of deterioration is one-dimensional, incomplete and out of date. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that journalism is going to adapt and flourish; you just need to know where to look for it.

via Spike the gloom – journalism has a bright future.

Pew-Online-Americans-Attitudes-to-Internet-Privacy-Sept2013Based on everything they know and have heard about the internet, only 37% of American internet and smartphone users believe it’s possible for someone to use the internet completely anonymously, so that none of their online activities can be easily traced back to them. That’s one of the takeaways from a new study [pdf] by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, which also finds growing concerns regarding the amount of personal data available on the internet.

via Only 37% of Online Adults Believe They Can Use the Internet Anonymously.

ANA-In-House-Agency-Penetration-2013-v-2008-Sept201358% of client-side marketers report that their company has an in-house agency, a marked rise from 42% in 2008, according to new survey results from the Association of National Advertisers (ANA). In-house agencies are being asked to handle a wide range of creative, strategic, and media planning and buying services, per the report, with one-third or more also tasked with data/marketing analytics (42%) and content marketing (34%).

via In-House Agencies Becoming More Common; Tasked With Range of Services.

Experian-Email-Volume-Growth-Trends-Q2-2012-Q2-2013-Sept2013The average email subscriber gets 416 commercial messages per month, says Return Path, and that number may just get higher. The latest quarterly email benchmark study [download page] from Experian Marketing Services indicates that email volume grew by 17.9% year-over-year in Q2. That follows an 11.6% increase in Q1, a relatively modest 5.4% bump in Q4, and no change in Q3 2012. Open rates don’t seem to have suffered, though, with total and unique open rates up year-over-year during Q2.

via Brands Are Sending More and More Emails.