Animated History of Home Siding Materials

Fixr has published their research of How the Use of Home Siding Materials Has Changed Over 40 Years as this animated data visualization changing the proportions over time.

It's a little odd to watch because it starts out looking like a bad pie chart with cute rounded corners. This is really a simple version of a voronoi diagram where the area of each section represents the proportional values.

The video above was created using the results from the census on exterior finishes of single-family homes. It looks at the historical use of wood, brick, stucco, vinyl, fiber and ‘other’ options starting in 1977 and ending in 2017. The census accounts for up to 1.6 million houses each year and includes homes across the U.S.A., so provides a broad look at how finishes have risen and fallen in popularity over the full period. These changes in popularity not only account for aesthetic fashionability but also availability, cost and practicality. From a trend perspective, each finish dominated a specific decade, in terms of houses completed in that finish. Brick dominated the 70s, wood dominated the 80s, vinyl, which only became available in the 90s, dominated that decade, and stucco and fiber cement dominated the 2000s. ‘Other’ materials also saw their highest use during the late 80s and 90s.

Visualization of Hurricane Florence's Path

Harry Stevens from Axios created a simple but great visualization of Why Hurricane Florence is so unusual — and so dangerous. The DataViz shows what makes the path of Hurricane Florence different than all of the past major hurricanes to hit the Carolinias.

Evolution of the English Alphabet

Matt Baker, the creater of the Evolution of the English Alphabet chart, traced the English alphabet all the way back to Proto-Sinaitic in 1750 BCE. This chart is a simplified version of his complete work called Writing Systems of the World and both can be found on UsefulCharts.com.

I made this chart last year as a bonus award on Kickstarter but am now making it available as a free download. Just right click on the above image (or long press on your mobile) and then select save.

UPDATE: I shared this on Twitter and it's my first tweet to reach over 10k RT's! Anyway, here's a few comments based on the feedback I've received:

• If you want to print it, here's a high-res version: English title | Latin title
• You're free to use the chart however you like so long as you don't sell it and so long as you give credit to either me (Matt Baker) or this website (UsefulCharts.com). I'm releasing it under a Creative Commons license.
• Fyi, the above chart was actually just a simplified promo for a much larger chart - a Writing Systems of the World poster. So, if you're concerned about the fact that thorn, wynn, or any other letters are missing, rest assured that they were indeed included on the main chart.
• If you have questions about why certain letters evolved the way that they did, I actually did a YouTube video on the topic. As for why so many of the letters flipped, it's because they used to be written in both directions. But with the introduction of ink, left to right eventually became standard (less smudging if you're right-handed).
• The fonts used include ProtoSinaitic (free), Alphabetum (commercial; used for the Ancient Greek/Latin lines) and Google Noto (free; used for Phoenician).
• "Shouldn't you have titled this 'Evolution of the Latin Alphabet?'" Well, yes, that would have been correct as well. But it's also not incorrect to refer to an "English alphabet". Obviously, many European languages use the same Latin script. But some use a slightly different number of letters. When one is referring to the set of Latin letters used for a particular language, it's ok to refer to that set as the "[language name] alphabet". (Update: I've included a version above with the title "Latin Alphabet" for those who would prefer it.)
• Many linguists provided feedback throughout the project, including Peter T. Daniels, one of the world's foremost experts on writing systems. You can find the full list of contributors here.
• I support a charity that does great educational work in rural Sri Lanka. If you're looking for a way to say thanks, consider making a donation. Or, if you purchase any of my other charts (including the Writing Systems of the World poster), a $1 donation will automatically be made.

Found on UsefulCharts.com

The Texas Infographic

Happy Texas Independence Day! March 2, 1836 was when when sixty delegates signed the Texas Declaration of Independence. This event marked Texas’ independence from Mexico.

The Texas Infographic was a joint project between History.com and NeoMam Studios as a summary of the major facts about Texas.

The layout is a little jumbled for my taste, but the key facts are all included. I prefer a clear story path so the readers know where to look to follow the information.

The ICO Explosion of 2017

ICO, or Initial Coin Offering, is a method of fundraising that doesn't sell equity of the company, but selling things called "tokens" or new forms of cryptocurrency. The method has been around for years, but the actual boom didn't start until mid 2017.The 4 Years of ICO Activity infographic from The Next Web shows a summary of the investments made. The video version below gives a more detailed timeline of when and where the companies obtained their investments.

Token sales and initial coin offerings (ICO) were certainly the hottest buzzwords of the year for thousands of recreational cryptocurrency enthusiasts and seasoned investors alike. But have you ever wondered precisely how much money was poured into this trend this year? There’s a visualization that can give you an idea.

Cryptocurrency startup Elementus has compiled a nifty animated visualization that shows every token sale that has successfully raised at least $100,000 since 2014. The graph also displays the entire cashflow that went into these ICOs, with detailed month-by-month information for the past four years.

As you will notice in the video below, following some minor activity for the first three years, all hell breaks lose around May 2017. You can see tens of ICOs kick off around the same time, securing millions in financial backing from cryptocurrency enthusiasts and investors.

To put all of this data together, Elementus went straight to the source and collected this information first-hand, gleaning the figures directly from the Ethereum and Bitcoin blockchains.

“We searched for every token, crowdsale, and multisig wallet we could find,” wrote Elementus founder and UPenn adjunct lecturer Max Galka. “We then identified the corresponding owners and added up the total amount of contributed funds – taken either from the blockchain itself or as reported by the fundraiser.”

Found on thenextweb.com

A Brief History of Printing

The Brief History of Printing infographic by Diginate looks back on over 2000 years of the industry. 

There aren't too many industries older than printing (!) - the origins go back to woodblock printing in 200AD!

To try and understand the route that the art of printing has taken through to today's digital formats we thought we'd create an infographic charting it's history, and make some predictions for it's future...

Nice, clean design.

Thanks to Vas for sending in the link!

Every Total Solar Eclipse in your Lifetime

With the upcoming eclipse moving across the U.S. in August, Denise Lu at the Washington Post has created some fantastic visualizations of Every Total Solar Eclipse Happening in your Lifetime.

On Aug. 21, a total solar eclipse will be visible from the contiguous United States. It’ll be the first to traverse coast to coast in nearly a century. There will be 69 total solar eclipses visible from somewhere on the planet in the next 100 years, but only a few will be visible from North America. See how many total solar eclipses are left in your lifetime:

The path of totality for the eclipse in August stretches from coast to coast — passing over Oregon in the west and moving all the way across the country to South Carolina in the east. This is a rare event; it’s the first time the path of totality will eclipse only over the contiguous United States.

The interactive globe visualization is fascinating. Enter your birth year, and it plots all of the solar eclipses that have occurred and will occur during your expected lifetime across the globe.

Thanks to FlowingData and Chiqui Esteban

How the iPhone Changed Visual Communication

How the iPhone Changed Visual Communication is a tribute to the profound impact the iPhone has had looking boack on it's 10th anniversary. From Shutterstock

The Sci-Fi Timeline

The Sci-fi genre contains some fantastic and horrifying ideas about the future, but how far away are they? The Sci-Fi Timeline created by Glow places classic sci-fi movies and games on a very long timeline.

We're all used to seeing movies and games set in the future, but often the date can seem a bit abstract.

We've brought together some of our favourites to show yo the timeline and where they all fit. There were some surprises!

See for yourself, and decide if the writers got it right!

Thanks to David for the link!

The Colors of Mister Rogers' Cardigans

Owen Phillips was recently transfixed watching a Mister Rogers' Neighborhood marathon, and after finding the data, visualized Every Color Of Cardigan Mister Rogers Wore From 1979–2001 for The Awl.

From Owen:

For the past few days I’ve been transfixed by the “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” marathon that began on Monday afternoon over on Twitch. Like watching the “Joy of Painting” with Bob Ross, zoning out to “Mister Rogers” is an exercise in escapism. After Rogers helped reset my brain I began to wonder about all the handsome, colorful sweaters he famously wore. Did Rogers have a favorite?

Fortunately, Tim Lybarger, a 40 year-old high school counselor from just outside of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, wondered the same thing a few years ago. Back in 2011, on his blog devoted to all things Mister Rogers, neighborhoodarchive.com, Lybarger recorded the color of every sweater Rogers wore in each episode between 1979 and 2001. “When I realized such a resource didn’t exist,” Lybarger told me over email, “I just felt like somebody needed to do it…might as well be me.”

The chart above uses the data Lybarger meticulously collected to show how Rogers’ preferences for the color of his cardigan changed over time.

When Owen organized them in a linear order, he found that color trends definitely appears. Later years had many more darker colors.

Found on FlowingData