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The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia
 
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The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia (Paperback)

~ David Mccandless (Author)
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
List Price: $26.99
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The World In Graphs
View sample pages from The Visual Miscellaneum by David McCandless [PDF].

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The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia + Visual Aid: Stuff You've Forgotten, Things You Never Thought You Knew, and Lessons You Didn't Quite Get Around to Learning + Visual Aid 2: You Can Never Know Enough Stuff
Price For All Three: $39.71

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Dangerous.to have on your desk if you have other work to get done..[T]he visuals will draw you in, and the sharpness of the questions some of them attempt to answer-and the efficiency with which they can communicate complex comparisons in a single page-will keep you hooked." (Omnivoracious )

"For those drowning in the digital age's information glut, Visual Miscellaneum, the new eye-popping book of infographics .makes the perfect antidote. . By turns alarming and humorous in its revelations, it's a timely, if meandering, look at the state of our world." (Coolhunting.com )

Product Description

The Visual Miscellaneum is a unique, groundbreaking look at the modern information age, helping readers make sense of the countless statistics and random facts that constantly bombard us. Using cutting edge graphs, charts, and illustrations, David McCandless creatively visualizes the world's surprising relationships and compelling data, covering everything from the most pleasurable guilty pleasures to how long it takes different condiments to spoil to world maps of Internet search terms.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 256 pages
  • Publisher: Collins Design; 1 edition (November 10, 2009)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0061748366
  • ISBN-13: 978-0061748363
  • Product Dimensions: 9.7 x 7.6 x 0.9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,573 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

    #2 in  Books > Reference > Fun Facts > Trivia
    #2 in  Books > Reference > Fun Facts > Curiosities & Wonders
    #7 in  Books > Reference > Catalogs & Directories > Directories

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More About the Author

David McCandless
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The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia
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Customer Reviews

21 Reviews
5 star:
 (6)
4 star:
 (9)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:
 (3)
1 star:
 (2)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (21 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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46 of 51 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Full of examples on how NOT to present information., November 25, 2009
By Christian Rudder (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This book's charts are very pretty to look at, but the quantative approach in many of them was so bad and so confusing that for the first 50 pages I thought I was reading a spoof.

On page 10, an area representing $21B is larger than one representing $27B, and $60B looks to be about half of $230B. On pages 60 - 65 the charts have no labels whatsoever, and so there's literally no way to tell what they're trying to say: it's just six pages of colorful polygons. You'll find these kinds of blunders on almost every page; I've just chosen a few early examples.

I know it seems like I'm nit-picking, but for a book claiming in its subtitle to be some kind of statistical "guide," such flaws are fatal. If you're at all interested in examples of beautifully presented and accurate information, please read Beautiful Evidence or The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, 2nd edition instead.
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Needs an editor, November 24, 2009
By Robert Shaver (Madison, WI) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
I love this book - creative and thought provoking - Thank you.
A few of the pages alone are worth the price of the book - political left vs political right, creationism vs evolutionism, nature vs nurture. Access to the web site for updates is a great idea.

Suggestion for author's consideration: please clean up the errors and omissions. This should be a five star book. For example: the visually beautiful and useful index excludes several pages of the book; Pages 60 to 65 are missing a number of details. As a result, the pages make no sense.
My advice to the reader - wait for a revised edition or hope that someone replaces the printer.



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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful, but..., December 2, 2009
By btitze (Germany) - See all my reviews
As pointed out in other reviews and in comments on the Website [...], there are mistakes in this book that make you question the validity of many of the graphs. There are incorrect figures and scaling errors. For example, why does an area representing $60B look about half as large as one for $230B?

I want to make it very clear that the approach to visualize information this way is excellent, but the author seems to have given priority to artistic expression rather than accuracy.

Also, there are labels missing on several pages, due to a technical fault. ([...]) I would wait for a new edition with corrections.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars disappointing
As others have stated, there are gross inaccuracies in some of the visualizations. Overall the book feels a lot like a student project, and not a professionally produced design... Read more
Published 13 days ago by Mr. M

4.0 out of 5 stars Love this book
I Loved this book. As someone who loves random trivia, it was the perfect read. I loved the collection of information and imagery. Read more
Published 19 days ago by GatsbyFan

4.0 out of 5 stars Awesome
I gave this book as a gift - it is not only beautiful, it gives statistics comprehension. There was a misprint, and the author has made an effort to give buyers a printout to... Read more
Published 20 days ago by A. B. Maran

1.0 out of 5 stars The Visual Miscellaneum: In Desperate Need of a Visualization Editor
On a cursory glance, The Visual Miscellaneum by David McCandless looks pretty good. The book covers a wide breath of topics and everything is very colourful. Read more
Published 20 days ago by PantherModem

4.0 out of 5 stars Great idea, Really Gets You Thinking
This is a very interesting and unusual book. The problem? It needs to be a lot clearer and a lot better organized. Read more
Published 22 days ago by George M.

3.0 out of 5 stars Buenas infografías, interesantes datos, pero nada más.
Es un libro que se lee rápido, que apunta a ser un almanaque más que una guía de diseño.
Basicamente es la presentación de datos de consumo/tendencias globales en formatos... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Gustavo Soto Mino

4.0 out of 5 stars A pleasant book not to be confused with the Tufte's of the world
The visual miscellaneum is a nice "read" and despite a few shortcomings (some charts lack enough legend items to be readable) it delivers the powerful message that complex topics... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Mathieu M. Guerville

5.0 out of 5 stars What a book
The score doesn't allow half stars, so I went with 5. It should be 4.5, though. The only reason is because of the errors. The book is still worth the purchase. Amazing.
Published 1 month ago by David Gerritsen

4.0 out of 5 stars An amazing array of information and ideas ( with some editing gafs)
As a gift for the holidays this was the hit in our house. Each page displays visual representations of various kinds of data-from death rates to music, books read to the loss of... Read more
Published 1 month ago by a gentle sound

2.0 out of 5 stars MIssing Text
As others have noted, the book is full of flaws. I did download the corrections off the author's Web site. About 16 pages are missing text or have errors. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Scott A. Lukas

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