Review (PDF) Knowledge Is Beautiful: Impossible Ideas, Invisible Patterns, Hidden Connections--Visualized
In this sequel to the bestselling book The Visual Miscellaneum, author David McCandless uses stunning and unique visuals to reveal unexpected insights into how the world really works.Every day, every hour, every minute we are bombarded with information, from television, from newspapers, from the Internet, we’re steeped in it. We need a way to relate to it. Enter David McCandless and his stunning infographics, simple, elegant ways to interact with information too complex or abstract to grasp any way but visually. McCandless creates visually stunning displays that blend the facts with their connections, contexts, and relationships, making information meaningful, entertaining, and beautiful. And his genius is as much in finding fresh ways to provocatively combine datasets as it is in finding new ways to show the results.Knowledge is Beautiful is a fascinating spin through the world of visualized data, all of it bearing the hallmark of David McCandless’s boundary-breaking, signature style. The captivating follow-up to the bestseller The Visual Miscellaneum, Knowledge is Beautiful offers a deeper, more ranging look at the world and its history, with more connectivity between the pages, a greater exploration of causes and consequences, and a more inclusive global outlook. With a portion of its content crowd-sourced from McCandless’s international following, Knowledge is Beautiful achieves a revolutionary and democratic look at the key issues from questions on history and politics, the facts of science, streams of literature, and much more.This is a project that will truly push the boundaries of books everywhere, providing insights into our world in a way never seen before.
Flexibound: 256 pages
Publisher: Harper Design (October 21, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0062188224
ISBN-13: 978-0062188229
Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 0.9 x 9.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #53,518 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #33 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Trivia & Fun Facts #84 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Puzzles & Games > Trivia #163 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Pop Culture > Art
What a pleasant concept. Many of the charts are thought provoking. On balance, though, I can not recommend this text. Here's why.Some of the charts are not legible. In several cases, the amount of information is so great as to force the type to a size no longer readable without the aid of a powerful magnifier. Also, in many cases, the type face is not intended to be legible in a smaller size. It is easy to see that most of the charts are really designed for a much larger space and were simply reduced for printing.In other cases, heavy reverse colors, and obscuring background colors make image recognition almost impossible. Heavy solids with very thin reverse lines are not the best choice for lithography, though the printer seems to have favored consistent solids in deference to legibility. A lot more work went into the chart concept than went into the selection of type and color breaks. The introduction layout is so generous and easy to read as to be a miss-fit with the rest of the book.
Some of the visualizations are unique and thought provoking. I wish I could see it on a bigger screen. Zooming in on the bitmap images causes them to blur terribly. Apparently, I cannot see this book on my Windows 7 machine. Windows 8 is required. I need a magnifier to read the charts on my iPad. Also, I am not sure about the data points relative to the image ratios behind the charts. Some of them seem incorrect.
Kindle version is very poor - graphics are too small and I cannot make it whats on it.
For those of use who love to immerse ourselves in facts. While it's not JUST a trivia book, this is one of the more interesting trivia books I've purchased in a long time. I got it for my brother and his son who both love information and logic. This book not only contains a wealth of unimportant (and important) information but sorts it differently (conceptually and visually). It teaches, therefore, new ways of thinking, seeing and sorting information. Since statistics like these are constantly changing, I wouldn't expect the information in the book to be eternally accurate but it's still a valuable purchase.
This book is required for a course that I am taking and I made the mistake of purchasing the Kindle version initially. I tried using it on a couple of different devices; It did not work on my MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011. Latest OS). I kept getting a "Not Compatible with device" error. I did manage to open the book on my iPad but I could hardly see anything. I wish they would mention something about these issues in the Kindle description. Anyhow, I had to order the hard copy. The book is well "written" and definitely captures your attention. We saw some of the author's Ted Talks in School and it was pretty impressive. Overall, I would definitely NOT recommend the Kindle version! If you DO need this book, get the hard copy.
The content of the book is on point with the author's intent of demystifying data. The presentation is well-thought, logical, and intuitive. In many cases, however, the info graphic becomes illegible owing to the color selection, typeface, and the most-irritating binding. Many lines, words, and graphics fall in the chasm of the binding and are permanently lost. It's apparent some graphics were intended for a single page in a much larger format. It appears cramming it onto two smaller and bound pages was an unfortunate concession.Overall, the book is 5 stars.Presentation is 4 (a few charts leave you wondering what question the data are meant to answer or yearning for details beyond a composite score. Also, the absence of any conclusions is irritating, albeit probably not the author's intent).The physical format is 1 star. Spiral binding would be far superior where margins are not provided.
Book does what it says ... Amazing amount of work behind these infographics, there is something in every visual that makes you think and the beauty doesn't detract from the importance (or fun!). A work of art and passion.
Very interesting "read". Definitely set aside some time each time you plan to crack open this book, because there are so many dimensions to each pictorial that if you enjoy learning knew things, you WILL get sucked into this one. Author of the book also has some very interesting Ted Talks, which is where I first heard of him. If you are hesitant to pull the trigger on this book, start with his free Ted Talks, you won't be disappointed.(PS: I accidentally posted a very similar review on another book I purchased. Writing reviews tired is not always a good idea. Anyways, that review was meant to go here, with this book)
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