From “Tools for a Revolution”:

Even at their most rough, angular, and controversial, online communication technology, tools, and platforms have shown the potential to shift the balance of power to a nation’s people. And we, the people who will shape the intelligent content and communication platforms of tomorrow, can play an important role in safeguarding this power.

Marking something of a departure from my usual fare, this was as exhilarating to write as it was humbling. I am hugely indebted to team Trunksy for helping me buff this to a fine shine.

From as far back as I can remember I’ve enjoyed lifting the lid on things to expose its hidden mechanics.

When, as a child, any household appliance or toy had broken beyond repair I’d jump at the chance to perform one of my directionless and inconclusive autopsies. Whether I knew what I was looking for, or at, mattered little, I was having too much fun to care.

But while I’d consider myself a keen and committed dismantler and occasional repairer, I’m no natural builder of things. What I mean is that I often lack the skills and knowledge to build something beyond prefabrication. To say, for instance, that I’ve built a working personal computer by sourcing and assembling the separate component parts would be perfectly true, but this was only achieved by carefully following instructions that I had no desire or reason to contradict or doubt. These step-by-step guides meant this layman didn’t need to understand in great detail what these components were and why they were needed.

This isn’t to belittle this kind of activity. I believe the assembly of a prefabricated system that works as intended is a more creative operation than pulling something to pieces. While the latter schooled me in the art of classification and labelling the former taught me an even greater lesson: that it’s not the separate component parts that matter, but the evolving system as a whole.

This lesson is something I think we can all take something from, particularly when trying to help an organisation or a group of content creators make that daunting leap from thinking and working in whole ‘pages’ of content to a system of smaller, dynamic modules, which could fly off in all manner of directions and co-exist with content from other groups and departments.

In nature, evolution happens not in isolation but in combination. To survive and thrive in an environment requires sharing it with others, not just simply demonstrating ruthless efficiency and aggression. It goes without saying that these departments and teams must be allowed to compete with one another to push through their own agendas and secure budgets, but I’m a big believer in encouraging people to take some shared responsibility for this organisation-wide adaptation process. To make this work there needs to be unity, co-operation as well as smart and sensible delegation; where the right people from the right departments get to work on the right things. As obvious as this sounds, it still amazes me how often a clash of egos or lingering frictions from a past episode manages to hamper such progress.

Working together in this manner also breeds a collective sense of responsibility for the future. When more people are encouraged to branch out from their own areas of influence and acquire a deeper understanding of the overall interconnectedness of a system the more they will help establish a culture of healthy restlessness. So even when faced with the challenge of supporting an increasing amount of devices, platforms and standards–fuelled by a fiercely competitive mobile marketplace–the system continues to evolve with widespread support, care and appreciation.

[Image credit: green circuit board by Peter Shanks]

When you’re engrossed in a good book nothing else matters. You could be chilled to the bone, within earshot of a cacophony of noise, or being tossed around like a rag doll in a train carriage, but it’s still not enough to disturb that bubble. That’s one of reading’s many beauties: the opportunity for escapism.

But what’s it going to take for you to pick up that book? You know, the one that might help you finish that essay, broaden your horizons, or increase your earning potential? The one we make elaborate excuses for not reading?

I believe this where an online book reading platform like Readmill has huge potential.

Picking up the book you know you should be reading

Buying or borrowing a book on a subject may seem a significant rung up the ladder, but acquiring it is just about the easy part. The real test is when it’s sitting neatly on your bookshelf or desk, or loaded into your Ebook reader, and has been for some time. Who or what is going to push you to prize open that cover?

Learning amongst others, particularly in an academic setting, should be just about ideal. But how often did our required reading largely consists of big, heavy textbooks laden with hundreds of pages with tiny type and an equally uninspiring cover? This coupled with an unfortunate feeling that many of your contemporaries weren’t taking things as seriously as they could was enough to cause that initial late summer buzz to wilt by late autumn.

Frustration and panic can provide short jolts. If you work yourself up into a mood you can do just about anything, but that’s hardly the ideal frame of mind for taking in information. This often feels more like some sort of punishment.

Waiting for a chance to question a book can work. Instead of moving from cover to cover you use it as a reference; relying on the strength of its index to dip in and out when the time arises. But how do you know if the real solution you’re looking for is not on the page you’ve already read and understood but on a page you haven’t?

It matters not that this book may make a great deal of difference to your circumstances. It’s hard work reading when your mind wants to wander off in search of more appealing and safer subjects; when your focus and concentration drifts in and out, causing you to revisit whole passages you’ve failed to take in.

Making time for reading–particularly if it follows a regular pattern–obviously helps. Half an hour once a day is a good deal better than three and a half late on a Sunday. And being good to yourself afterwards can also provide the motivation to attack unappealing text with added vigour.

But how about sharing these issues and your book-reading progress with others trying to do precisely the same thing? Discussing a book amongst people with different views, backgrounds, and experience can enhance your understanding of a subject. And, by the same token, sharing your highlights and insights can alert others to things they may have missed or didn’t consider important at the time.

They’ll help push you just as much as you’ll help push them.

[Image credit: book sale look by ginnerobot]

Despite these misgivings, I’m prepared to openly profess my enjoyment of, and brace yourselves … preference for, reading from a screen, particularly for long periods. Though I’ve the distinct feeling this opinion will run counter to many of your own, I make no apologies for expressing it. In fact, it’s largely due to their adaptability that I’ve come to rely on these handheld devices; allowing me to adjust the display brightness under diminishing light, ramp up the text size when my eyes are failing me, and summon up a dictionary when I stumble across an archaic word or phrase. It’s all very Fisher-Price, I grant you, but though they will never look, feel, or indeed smell like a good book ought to, they can provide almost everyone with comfortable reading conditions.

Over the course of the last six months, I’ve slowly grown to love eBooks. I’d now go as far as to say that, faced with a straight choice, I’m prepared to plump for an eBook over its undeniably more handsome and impressive physical counterpart. And so it was during this period of discovery when the death of Project Gutenberg’s founder Michael Hart was announced. The availability of thousands of out of copyright books in digital form from many of the world’s greatest authors still amazes me just as much as when I first learned about the project’s existence ten or so years ago. It’s an incredible legacy to leave behind, and one I couldn’t help but feel should be celebrated in some way.

The challenge

If there’s one thing I’m very good at, it’s devoting a tremendous amount of time to pointless exercises: getting hopelessly lost down endless Wikipedia rabbit holes [I've only just this minute taken a mere six steps to get from Jack Lemmon to Samuel Pepys], staring blankly at walls as though they’re a magic eye puzzle, and generally waiting around for something more exciting to happen. So I thought I’d try and curtail these and other wasteful causes by taking on a challenge that cannot be completed until this time next year: to spend the next 52 weeks reading 52 eBooks.

To the reading pod

It was always going to take something special to prize me away from iBooks and Readmill was just that. In addition to offering an equally comfortable and pleasurable reading experience, it allows me to keep up with what my friends and contemporaries are reading, as well as share thoughts and highlights from what I’m reading. Readmill will be my weapon of choice for this challenge, so you’ll be able to keep up with my progress, should you be interested and intrigued by it. I dare say I’ll also tweet about this from time to time.

The list

If the strength and feasibility of an idea can be roughly measured by how one feels about it after a night’s sleep, then I suppose a good one must survive a further six. I’m happy to report that I remain as excited by the prospect of this challenge as I was when I began drawing up the longlist of titles, which were soon whittled down to the final 52 below.

I cannot think of a more appropriate way to celebrate one person’s vision and audacity than to read a few books in the digitised form he introduced forty years ago.

I feel as though I’ve already gone some way towards ensuring an interesting year. I guess whatever I do, or wherever I pitch up over the course of the next twelve months, I’ll never be too far away from my eBook reader. Wish me luck.

The Web Is a Customer Service Medium

Paul Ford, Ftrain.com, January

“The days of the web as all-purpose media emulator are numbered. Apps on mobile are gaining traction; the web browser, despite great and ongoing effort, will not become the universal platform for everything ever. Apps provide niche experiences. People apparently like niche experiences enough to pay for them. This is serious.”

The summary comprised of exactly 140 characters: When the web’s fundamental question is Why wasn’t I consulted?, we must create a service experience around the product, whatever it may be.

Series: Context in Content Strategy

Daniel Eizans, danieleizans.com, January

“Web sites need both context and content strategy because there is a world of difference between “attention” and “engagement.” Getting people to the site and getting attention is step one of the process. Engagement is what creates meaning for users and is ultimately what leads to metrics that matter: ROI, return visits, brand trust, potential word of mouth, etc.”

The summary that just about passes for one: An excellent 5-part series explaining some of the ideas and principles behind tailoring content to different user situations and behaviours.

Series: What do content strategy deliverables look like?

Rahel Bailie, Intentional Design Inc. blog, January

“If you were thrown off a boat into a lake, you would figure out how to swim. For the pioneers of content strategy, this was certainly the case. We reasoned out the processes and deliverables based on what we needed to accomplish by the end of the project. It’s still that way, for much of the practice. It has to be. You need to respond to existing situations, and work within the infrastructures and plans in place. It’s basic consulting practice: understand the current state, anticipate the future state, find the gap, and figure out how to fill it.”

The summary that always reads the small print: Though varied in form and purpose by a project’s individual requirements, there’s a lot we can learn by studying the deliverables of others.

The Content Strategy of Product (Parts 1 and 2)

Jeffrey MacIntyre, Arc90 blog, March

“A genuine product strategy for a content offering must consider the business model, remembering always that content is expensive. Free, paid or otherwise on the one hand, and the possibilities of licensing and syndicating content on the other, a complete content strategy must take a position and rationale on the business case of its recommendations.”

The summary that believes it’s better to be heard and not seen: Jeff tells us that when the content strategy is the business strategy, it requires an approach that envelopes the whole infrastructure.

Orbital Content

Cameron Koczon, A List Apart Magazine, April

“In the traditional business model, consumers vote with their dollars. If they like something, they buy it. If not, they don’t. In the orbital content model, users vote with their content. If an app offers something interesting, they’ll share their content with it. If not, they won’t. Because the content is in orbit around the users, they directly determine who has access to it. Applications will no longer ask for our credentials to other services; instead, they will ask you directly to lend them the content they want to make useful.”

The summary that can only be read under a microscope: Cameron explains how bookmarking content at the element level, rather than whole web pages, can foster closer connections with an audience.

If the internet gave free back rubs, people would complain when it stopped because its thumbs were sore

Charlie Brooker, Comment is free at guardian.co.uk, June

“In 1986, when I was 15, a 12in single cost roughly £2.99 – the equivalent of just over £6 today. And unless you were loaded, you didn’t just buy records willy-nilly. You chose carefully and coveted what you had. … I’m not claiming five quid a month [for a Spotify subscription] is insignificant: it’s more than many can afford. But in this case it’s bloody cheap for what it gets you.”

The summary that could never been used as an acceptance speech: When Spotify imposed further restrictions on its free usage, Charlie noted some rather unfortunate human traits that such changes arouse.

Why even introverts should mouth off online

Gabriel Smy, SmyWord, June

“On the web, consumer purchasing is not the only economy. Attention is the resource so many artists and businesses are competing for, or, more to the point since social media exploded, approval. That’s why a positive review on Amazon or TripAdvisor or Checkatrade means so much to the author, hotel, or tradesperson. There are people whose livelihoods literally depend on your rating.”

The summary that sold its last Oxford comma to buy food: Gabriel’s right. Lurkers like me should put aside those niggling doubts and let others know when we’ve enjoyed or benefited from a service.

Waving not drowning: or how I gave in and learned to love the content strategy flood.

Relly Annett-Baker, rel.ly, July

“I don’t know anywhere near everything there is to know about content strategy but here is something I do know: it takes a lot of confidence to say those words out loud, to a client, in a meeting. The difficulty is that content strategy is so big and covers so many aspects that I think we will have to get better at saying it. Before long we might increasingly need to band together in small mercenary tribes to cover the range of skills within CS, especially for larger projects.”

The summary that has always wanted to ride a roller coaster: Does that feeling of being left behind leave you knotted? Never fear, you’re not alone in trying to catch a runaway train on a pump trolley.

Damon Green’s account of *that* Ed Milliband interview

Damon Green, via TwitLonger, July

“If news reporters and cameras are only there to be used by politicians as recording devices for their scripted soundbites, at best that is a professional discourtesy. At worst, if we are not allowed to explore and examine a politician’s views, then politicians cease to be accountable in the most obvious way. So the fact that the unedited interview has found its way onto YouTube in all its absurdity, to be laughed at along with all the clips of cats falling off sofas, is perfectly proper.”

The summary that weighs the same on the surface of Mars: British politician offers interviewer glimpse of a nightmarish dystopian future ruled by robots with a limited supply of phrases. Observe.

Domain Knowledge: What You Need – Or Don’t Need – To Know

Corey Vilhauer, Eating Elephant, July

“Remember: we are not hired for our knowledge in the domain. We are hired for our ability to communicate that knowledge in a way that’s both usable and useful for that domain’s audiences. And we do this by relying on our relationships, not by diving into a project all guns a’blazin’, all the answers predetermined and worked out.”

The summary that even the old woman who lived in a shoe found room for: Often, it’s better to know where to look and who to consult for knowledge, for it rests easy in the hands of the passionate individual.

Structured Content, Shifting Context: Responsive Design, Content Strategy & the Future

Sara Wachter-Boettcher, EndlesslyContent.com, August

“It’d be easy to leave [responsive design] to designers and developers. But content strategists and others who care about content still have a big job to do in making responsive design possible. After all, it’s rather hard to know how each element associated with a piece of content should respond to changes in display unless you know what that piece of content is intended to do.”

The summary that could be carved onto a pencil tip: A design approach that optimises the web for different users and devices is fascinating. There’s much to do to aid its widespread adoption.

Making up Stories: Perception, Language, and the Web

Elizabeth McGuane and Randall Snare, A List Apart Magazine, August

“When we learn, we move from sound to word, sentence to paragraph. Linguistic units are literally the building blocks of our engagement with the world. And there’s no reason why the increasingly modular nature of web content should diminish our understanding—rather, it may have the capacity to increase it, prompting us to make inferences and create stories ourselves, rather than passively engaging with static texts.”

The summary that was once a flea circus ringmaster: Elizabeth and Randall show us why storytelling elements are necessary to build content frameworks that flow with a user’s imagination.

Babies and the Bathwater

Mandy Brown, Contents magazine, November

“We can no longer think of publishing as a broadcast medium. It isn’t, not anymore. The web requires that we listen and converse as much as (if not more than) we ship. In fact, we cannot assume that publishing of any kind is a distinct activity from belonging to a community. Part of the job of a publisher today is to facilitate discussion—and that means being a part of it. It means that we publish for people, not to them.”

The summary that could be carried by a miniature gold llama: I dare you not to emerge from the other side of Mandy’s masterpiece inspired, uplifted, and thankful that you work on the web for a living.

Some honourable mentions

• Review: Infinity Blade—J. Nicholas Geist, Kill Screen Daily, Pre 2011*
• A Simpler Page—Craig Mod, A List Apart Magazine, January
• Series: Tags are magic—Martin Belam and Peter Martin, guardian.co.uk, January
• The Value of Content, Part 2: Nobody’s Perfect—Melissa Rach, Brain Traffic blog, June
• Information Infrastructure as a Process—Dorian Taylor, doriantaylor.com, June**
• Visualizing Paths Through the Web—Dorian Taylor, doriantaylor.com, July**
• The Things We Make and Do—Erin Kissane, Brain Traffic blog, July
• The End of Client Services—Khoi Vinh, Subtraction.com, July
• Web Governance: Becoming an Agent of Change—Jonathan Kahn, A List Apart Magazine, August
• Consuming Content vs. Loving Language—Sara Wachter-Boettcher, EndlesslyContent.com, September
• The web professional’s choice: linchpin or cog—Jonathan Kahn, lucid plot, October
• The poetics of interfaces—Elizabeth McGuane, mapped blog, October

*too epic to exclude

**last updated

Here’s a video of my talk from last month’s CS Forum 2011 in London. I had the pleasure of sharing the stage with some incredibly smart folk, so do make yourself comfortable and watch them all, particularly the excellent lightning talks by Shelly, Matthew, Nicole, and Sara.

Presentation links

• See the finished diagram on visualizing.org
• View the survey results on Flickr
• Study the survey data spreadsheet

Let me begin by extending a huge and sincere thanks to everyone who played their part in this, particularly those who responded to the survey, encouraged others to do so, and remained patient as I worked out what to do with the results, and to the attendees of CS Forum 2011 who offered such kind words following my sole destroying (you had to be there) attempt to squeeze the last six months into 20 minutes. I can’t deny it’s been fun.

Though the finished diagram is by no means perfect, I can say with a measure of confidence that not only are these the six commonest paths today’s practising content strategists have taken to reach the discipline, but that they demonstrate the extent of our varied skills and approaches. It only serves to emphasise how much we need to continue sharing a little of what we’ve picked up along the way.

The professional backgrounds of content strategists

Q10. To what extent does your work now relate to what you were doing five years ago?

Key findings

• While it’s not a huge surprise to learn that a combined 81% of all respondents considered the role they were in five years ago had “A great deal” and “A fair amount” of relevance to what they are doing now, you may be a little more interested to learn that 12% more females than males felt this way

Data summary for professional relevance in 2006

Q11. What job title, if anything, did you have written on your business card five years ago?

Description

• Made up of nodes and edges (lines), this network diagram displays the interconnected relationships between the job titles survey respondents had in 2006. The size of the primary and secondary nodes indicate the number of links between occupational groups, while the thickness of the edges indicates the weight of the relationships between two nodes

Key findings

• Of the 251 respondents who answered this question, 77% were working in the media, IT and artistic sectors in 2006

Comments

• To help categorise the job sectors, I used the British Office for National Statistics’ Standard Occupational Classification 2010 coding index
• You may have noticed that clicking on the above diagram takes you its visualizing.org entry, where you will be able to zoom and pan to your heart’s content

Q12. How, if at all, have your professional responsibilities and competencies changed from five years ago?

Description

• This word cloud, created using Wordle.net, has given greater prominence to the words frequently used by the 224 respondents who answered this question

Selected quotes from the responses to this question

I know much more about content strategy than I did five years ago, but my authority hasn’t yet increased to the point where I can implement much more of it.

Respondent #1 – Male, aged between 26-30, United Kingdom

I manage workflow, make recommendations on voice and style, manage a team, [and] create navigation. Before, I just wrote articles.

Respondent #7 – Female, aged between 31-35, Southern United States

I get included in projects at an earlier stage, and my input is treated with far more respect. These days I am asked for my “professional opinion” on language usage, usability, strategy and management issues, whereas previously I was asked how to spell a word once in a while.

Respondent #14 – Female, aged between 31-35, Africa

Many more meetings at which my input is listened to and valued, no longer an observer.

Respondent #81 – Female, aged between 46-50, Australasia

More strategy, less “throw it all against the wall and see what sticks.”

Respondent #122 – Male, aged between 31-35, Midwestern United States

I am much less “in the trenches” and much more involved with higher level staff and executives, providing guidance and recommendations. I suspect this has happened because the value of content strategy is being recognized more widely.

Respondent #101 – Male, aged between 41-45, Northeastern United States

I stay out of meetings whereever [sic] possible. I like to chuck in a content audit like a grenade and see what happens.

Respondent #242 – Female, aged between 56-60, United Kingdom

Comments

• With more responsibility and respect comes big breakthroughs. My, we’ve come a long way. I genuinely found some of these stories really rather touching. I’m half tempted to publish them in full

Q13. To what extent does your work now relate to what you were doing ten years ago?

Key findings

• Unsurprisingly, we have a far more even spread of figures than those of five years later. At this point in time plenty of respondents were still in formal education, some were on a completely different career path, while others were working for organisations that had yet to make the leap from offline to the web

Data summary for professional relevance in 2001

Q14. What job title, if anything, did you have written on your business card ten years ago?

Description

• Made up of nodes and edges (lines), this network diagram displays the interconnected relationships between the job titles survey respondents had in 2001. The size of the primary and secondary nodes indicate the number of links between occupational groups, while the thickness of the edges indicates the weight of the relationships between two nodes

Key findings

• We still have the majority of the 227 respondents who answered this question working in the media, IT and artistic sectors, but due largely to the drop in responses, plus a fair proportion of the respondents working in unrelated fields or in formal education, the diagram appears much more spread out as a result

Comments

• Once again, I used the British Office for National Statistics’ Standard Occupational Classification 2010 coding index to categorise the job sectors
• Clicking on the above diagram takes you its visualizing.org entry, where you will be able to zoom and pan to your heart’s content

Q15. How, if at all, have your professional responsibilities and competencies changed from ten years ago?

Description

• This word cloud, created using Wordle.net, has given greater prominence to the words frequently used by the 184 respondents who answered this question

Selected quotes from the responses to this question

I used to be a sheep, and now I’m a shepherd.

Respondent #29 – Female, aged between 41-45, Canada

10 years ago web work was only a small proportion of my role. I had less authority to make major changes to content that I was putting on websites. I would pretty much put up whatever was given me, with basic QA and layout changes. Was able to develop my own IA because there was no centralized web governance at that stage.

Respondent #81 – Female, aged between 46-50, Australasia

The big change is that now my work involves close collaboration with others in UX or IA rather than IT and engineering.

Respondent #101 – Male, aged between 41-45, Northeastern United States

I actually sort of do the same thing – except digitally, as opposed to in museum galleries. Crafting messages, collecting “artifacts” [sic], organizing everything, coordinating all the players – now, I just do it on the Web.

Respondent #137 – Female, aged between 41-45, Northeastern United States

Comments

• More stories of increased responsibility and respect were to be found alongside examples of how respondents had been able to draw on the skills and experience picked up while working within other allied professions

Matchup: Q13. To what extent does your work now relate to what you were doing ten years ago? vs. Q10. To what extent does your work now relate to what you were doing five years ago?

Description

• This diagram demonstrates how, in the five years between 2001 and 2006, our work gained far more relevance to the kind we’re doing today

Key findings

• 25% of respondents believed that five years on from 2001 their careers had “A great deal” of relevance to what they do today
• 30% of respondents who considered the role they were in ten years ago had “Not very much” or no relevance to what they are doing now or weren’t working at the time considered their role five years later had “A great deal” and “A fair amount” of relevance

Data summary for change in professional relevance between 2001 and 2006

What can you do with this data?

• Study the spreadsheet on Google docs
• Post your own sketches and visualisations on the Flickr group

The educational backgrounds of content strategists

Q8. To what extent has your educational route related to your work?

Key findings

• If we’re happy to consider a combination of the figures for “A great deal” and “A fair amount” to roughly indicate a high level of relevancy, then 60% of all respondents believed their educational route closely relates to their work. I’ve tried, and so far failed, to find a set of comparative figures from elsewhere which could indicate how common it is for graduates to study something in one field, only to end up with a career in another. If anyone knows of such a study, I’d love to hear about it

Comments

• One respondent answered “Don’t know” for this question – so it’s not strictly 0%. See the data summary below for a more accurate breakdown of the figures

Matchup #1: Q1. What is your gender? vs. Q8. To what extent has your educational route related to your work?

Key findings

• 64% of all female respondents considered their educational route had “A great deal” and “A fair amount” of relevance to their work, as opposed to 56% of males

Comments

• Though it may not have been entirely obvious at first glance, vertical dashes have been used to indicate the position of the overall shares from question eight

Matchup #2: Q2. Which age bracket do you fall into? vs. Q8. To what extent has your educational route related to your work?

Key findings

• Of the 51% share of respondents aged between 31 and 40, 64% considered their educational route had “A great deal” and “A fair amount” of relevance to their work

Comments

• The original age bracket categories have been merged to squeeze the data
• Vertical dashes have been used to indicate the position of the overall shares

Matchup #3: Q4. For what kind of organisation do you work? vs. Q8. To what extent has your educational route related to your work?

Key findings

• It’s a tale of two extremes for self-employed or freelance respondents, with a combined 44% who either considered their educational route had “A great deal” of relevance to their work or “Not at all”. To be fair, the relatively small overall share belonging to this category (16%) may have contributed to these figures

Comments

• Due to insufficient data, I refrained from including the “Government agency”, “Non-profit”, “School, college, university” and “Startup” categories in this graphic
• Vertical dashes have been used to indicate the position of the overall shares

Data summary for educational relevance

Q9. Which subject(s) provided your highest level of educational attainment?

Description

• This type of information visualization is known as a bubble race. Each bubble represents a field of study. The size of each bubble indicates how many respondents studied in this field. The vertical position of each bubble indicates how relevant respondents considered each field of study was to the work they do today

Key findings

• Despite its size, the field of technical communication provided the highest amount of “A great deal” responses. In fact, everyone who studied technical communication considered it to be highly relevant
• On the opposite end of the scale, economics provided the highest amount of “Not at all” responses
• The fields of English language and literature alone accounted for 58% of all listed fields of study

Comments

• I counted 121 different fields of study, 70 of which were omitted from this diagram due to only being mentioned once. Believe me, you’d need to possess a pair of eyes capable of spotting specks of dust on a fly’s nose from three miles away to pick them out
• Time to come clean: considering the survey’s global audience, this question was poorly worded. Somehow, in spite of this, I still received a great response. Littered amongst the replies from respondents who had successfully decoded my bizarre request were the puzzled comments of the poor souls who hadn’t have the foggiest idea what I was asking them to do. “Call me an idiot but I’m not sure what you mean here”, said one. “I’m not sure what this question means”, said another. And, in what was possibly the most damming chide of all, another asked: “Isn’t clear language a part of good survey design?”. Usually, yes

What can you do with this data?

• Study the spreadsheet on Google docs
• Post your own sketches and visualisations on the Flickr group

Where to find and hear from me

There will be a number of ways to keep up with my progress:

Tumblr

At the risk of alienating regular visitors to this parish with pointless tales of mood swings, broken pencil tips and tea consumption, I’ll be microblogging from the relative safety of a dedicated Tumblr blog.

Twitter

Follow me @richardjingram, where I’ll be making good use of the wholly unimaginative #csdiagram hashtag to relay tales of woe and whoa.

Flickr

As soon as I’ve brushed away the last remnants of eraser dust from my sketches and redacted any incriminating evidence from any screengrabs, I’ll be uploading the fruits of my labour to the dedicated Flickr group.

Audioboo

Hear ye, hear ye. From time to time, I’ll update you on my progress in the form of short audio pieces using the utterly charming Audioboo.

How you can get involved

Frankly, this would all be a bit dull without your input. These, my friends, are a few ways for you to missive your thoughts:

Tumblr

Anyone, subject to my approval, can submit their own posts to the Tumblr blog.

Twitter

Messages of support, helpful pointers, gentle mocking – I welcome them all. Tweet to the world using the #csdiagram hashtag or me directly @richardjingram.

Flickr

Comment on my sketches and screengrabs or, better still, post your own on the dedicated Flickr group.

Email

Email me at hello {at} richardingram.co.uk. I could be a little slow to reply, so be patient.