I watched the latest Hans Rosling talk on Ted Talks and it was as enlightening as it was entertaining. Professor Rosling has a wonderful way of captivating the audience and using visual data to tell a story.

This time, he highlights the ultimate scorecard – the United Nations (UN) scorecard of eight high level goals. Just in this initial view of eight images, you learn a lot about each goal. He continues the talk moving into a discussion of various metrics and the mistakes that can happen when you select the wrong metrics to compare, especially when you do so just to make the data say what you want it to say.

Enjoy the talk. I’m positive you’ll be smiling as you learn a few things. The ending left me saying, “Wow. Wow.” It’s powerful.

AMC - Content Marketing for BI and High Tech - Freelance Marketer for High Tech with a focus on BI

Came across this stunning TED video that demonstrates scientific data in both 3-D and audio. It’s not only functional but beautiful as well. Increasing the way we sense, perceive, and interact with data is brilliant. Is this the future of BI?

Having watched the video, I find a renewed appreciation for the super intelligent minds out there. The video showed just how complex data can be and I wonder if we can do something similar with our BI tools one day. Do we need super intelligence to understand our data?

AMC - Content Marketing for BI and High Tech - Freelance Marketer for High Tech with a focus on BI

I’ve always had a fondness for visual data, so in honor of the Olympics, I thought I’d share these winter sport and Olympic infographics I found. Maybe it’s my simple mind, but I appreciate their ability to distill complex information into a (relatively) simple graphical image. I’ve located these and offer them for your enjoyment.

Here’s everything you always wanted to know about the sport of curling:

Larger Image (infographic by Ciaran Hughes)

And also about bobsledding:

Larger Image (infographic by Stefan Bayley)

Here’s ice hockey:

(infographic by Ciaran Hughes)

My favorite sport, figure skating:

Infographic – Edward Tufte (click for larger image)

How about Olympic medals (not sure from which year):

(infographic by Ciaran Hughes)

And finally, an analysis of medals won per GDP using 2004 Summer Games data.

Larger image (infographic from Vizworld)

AMC - Content Marketing for BI and High Tech - Freelance Marketer for High Tech with a focus on BI