(This article was originally published at Junk Charts, and syndicated at StatsBlogs.)
Boston Globe has an eye-catching full-page poster about Hillary's current endorsements among 115 important New Hampshire people. (link) This is an excerpt of the poster:
Each of the 115 people are represented by a circle, with their names, titles and reasons for importance written below. The circles are colored according to the following legend:
I like the concept behind the chart, identifying the important endorsements and tabulating their current positions.
A tiny addition to the legend would much improve the readability of the whole poster:
I also wonder how the people are ordered on the chart. They are certainly not alphabetical. Is it geographical? By presumed influence? It's not clear.
Explaining the order will improve our comprehension. Let's assume the circles are ordered with the most influential people at the top. This knowledge immediately alters our perception of the chart. We now can see that Hillary has done well pretty evenly across the spectrum while O'Malley's two endorsement are in the bottom half of the ledger.
If this is indeed the ordering criterion, all the chart needs is an annotation to let readers know.
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