A Few good men

This looks to be a very good blog from Stephen Few.

In the same way a generation of 'web designers' were infused/mentored by HCI veterans. (respect as always to Jakob Nielsen et al), we may be seeing a similar thing for the data vis community.

The recent generation of young turks is doubtless having fun with data scrawling but at some point it will pass people by unless there is a purpose or utility to it. They've got the engagement sorted. These things are mostly usable. What they are not is useful.

That is where peopel like Few come in. They work in analytics - using data for decision making. They are ideal real-life mentors, solving real life problems. They can point the way to thinking of these apps as tools for whatever outcomes.

So, read all of his blog - all the archives too (i will) before you go anywhere near popcorn-data-blogs again.