Graph the State of the Union
The New York Times recently published a web tool that interactively displays the usage of specific words in President Bush's State of the Union addresses from 2000–2007. I'm not sure it's useful, but it's certainly impressive:
The 2007 State of the Union Address
-rob
Comments
The New York Times always provides great infographics. Of course it's useful to know how Mr. Bush's discourse/priorties have developed of the years. All information is good, and even more one concerning the State of the Union.
Posted by: asinomasimple | January 25, 2007 12:37 PM
I find the representation of the distribution of the words through the speaches fascinating. At first, I didn't realize that the grey lines represented other words in the text, but once I got it, I was impressed.
I'd like to see other texts given this treatment. I'm really curious about what the programming looks like, and how they work with the data.
Posted by: Kristin | January 25, 2007 01:05 PM
You can also click on each occurrence of a word to see the surrounding text (it appears at the bottom—"The word in context").
Posted by: Rob Simmon | January 25, 2007 01:22 PM
Yes, the user interface is fantastic--giving multiple access points to the data.
Posted by: Kristin | January 25, 2007 01:35 PM
I don't think this graphic really shows anything. For example, exactly what can you conclude by knowning the frequency and distribution of a single word? I think the layout and functionality (except for hanging the Flash during a long search) is fine. I just don't "see" a message here.
I guess I just think graphics should let people make conclusions or observations that have some meaning. Perhaps I'm just missing it here.
Posted by: Phillip | January 25, 2007 01:45 PM