Everyone learns and takes in information differently. I am a visual learner. I guess this makes sense since I have gravitated towards visual design and interactive media. Visually presenting data is one way to help people understand what the information is telling them. I know that I understand things better when I can visually see what is being described to me rather than just being presented with information.
I was impressed with the Many Eyes experiment. I thought they did have a point when they said people understand visualization even more when they themselves create it. At the same time, I think if information is not presented well visually it could have the opposite effect. If the visualization is too confusing, people will not understand the information that way either.
I thought that the video really fit with what we were doing in class and also drove home the point to me that it needs to be visually pleasing as well as informational. I have been struggling with creating infographics that are not only informational but also very visually pleasing. Data visualization is becoming an expressive language but it is also a challenge to master that language. I know that with our current infographic assignment, I have been working so hard on the functionality that I think it lacks aesthetics. I think that practice will help to master infographic design.