An oldie but goodie that one of my colleagues at Endeca just reminded me of is the Periodic Table of Visualization Methods by Ralph Lengler and Martin Eppler at Visual-Literacy.org.
Click through the picture to the real page, which shows you an example each visualization when you hover over it in the table.
Interestingly, tag clouds don’t show up in the table? Is this because the authors hate them, or that tag clouds aren’t sufficiently graphical to qualify as a visualization? I know many people who despise tag clouds–and I used to be one of them. But I think they have their place, and I’ll return to the subject some time soon.
The Noisy Channel 
4 replies on “Periodic Table of Visualization Methods”
Tag clouds can be very graphical and help to visualize anything http://www.nostrathomasnow.com/?p=21
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A related site that I love – which shows how beautiful (dare I say artistic) information visualization can be: http://www.visualcomplexity.com/vc/
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I’m boiling up a screed on tag clouds. I’ll welcome all comers.
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Mark, thanks for the link. And of course there’s IBM’s Many Eyes site: http://many-eyes.com/
Whit, looking forward to that screed. Meanwhile, I’ll start digging up the few redeeming examples of tag clouds that I’ve encountered in my virtual travels.
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