Data Analysis
Percentage of back-to-back women plays by station
This bar chart shows 29 country radio stations in the United States, listing the percentage of back-to-back plays of women for each station. Those percentages were ranked from highest to lowest. While the bar chart is easy to follow and clear to understand, some weaknesses stand out.
When I first saw this bar chart, my eyes immediately went to any bar that had colour on it. The bar with colour was from the radio station in San Antonio (KCYY-FM). The chart highlights the percentage of back-to-back women plays by each station. If my data was specifically looking at the station in San Antonio, that would be a great use of colour. Still, because we are looking at all the stations, it would have been nice to see a different colour representing the percentages, even though a line separates each one. The lines separating each percentage should be thicker and darker so it stands out to the audience looking at the chart. The San Antonio station was highlighted only because the data analyzed earlier in the article came from San Antonio. If it had just been San Antonio being highlighted, I would have changed the title to reflect that.
I can clearly distinguish between the highest percentage of radio plays versus the lowest percentage of radio plays. The Los Angeles radio station has the highest rate of back-to-back radio plays. In contrast, the Cincinnati radio station has the lowest percentage of back-to-back radio plays for women. This bar chart needs to clearly tell us the period for which this data is for. Just from looking at the data, there is no clear indication in the title or in the chart that tells me the period. This bar chart represents 29 radio stations and their percentages, which is a lot of data that can get overwhelming. This chart simplifies all that overwhelming information and makes it straightforward for people to read and understand. Overall, this chart did an excellent job of explaining the data clearly, but some tweaks need to be made to it. This data is separated into categories, so the bar chart is the best way to represent that data.
This bar chart was not interactive. A drop-down button with the options to show the highest percentage, lowest percentage, or a specific radio station made the chart more valuable and interactive.
Hi Kristina! Your analysis does a great job of clearly identifying the issues with color use and lack of time context in the visualization. One area for improvement would be to expand on how these issues affect the viewer's overall understanding of the data.
ReplyDeleteYo Kristina I really liked the topic/data you chose, super intresting! I liked that you also said this needs a makeover so that it's not so hard on the eyes, the colour is too similar to the background. Next time I would make the topic a bit more clear in the first paragraph about it being women's music.
ReplyDeleteHi Kristina, I think you did a good job explaining the strengths and weaknesses of this chart such as the San Antonio bar being the only bar with colour. If this was my assignment, I would have explained what the possible purpose of this chart would be and why it matters to have this data organized in a bar chart.
ReplyDeleteHello Kristina! This is a good breakdown of this chart, and your critique stating that you think that not having the time period is not benefiting this chart in the slightest is a good point and the chart would benefit from stating what year this sample is from. I believe that the critique on how the san Antonio is highlighted makes sense but in the context of the chart, they are specifying san Antonio as a sample, so it does make sense in the context. Yet still good work on this analysis!
ReplyDeleteKristina, I think you did a great job with your essay! You explained everything so clearly, and it was really easy to follow. The way you laid out your points and included examples made it simple to understand the concepts. Your writing style is very straightforward, which makes your ideas even stronger. Overall, I really enjoyed reading it, and I think you did an excellent job in breaking down the topic! Keep up the great work!
ReplyDeleteHello! This is so interesting! I absolutely cannot believe how low the percentages are for women artist back-to-back plays. As some of the other data describes you could pick songs randomly and get higher rates! I think you have made excellent points in your analysis. Particularly important is the lack of information about the time period through which this data was tracked. I also think that your point about the highlighting of the San Antonio station's data was well made. Even if the data was from San Antonio the way that the story is presented seems more general until they focus in on that point. Maybe if they mentioned when addressing the first data set that it was from San Antonio it would make more sense to focus on that city as a comparison, but they only mention it after you have scrolled through much of the page.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much for sharing your analysis!
Hi Kristina! I can tell you put some good thoughts into your points! I agree with how the title of the chart should reflect the key data of it (which in this case, the San Antonio data was emphasized with its contrasting blue color, and as such should be mentioned in the title). I, however, would've wished I could see the graph clearly to refer to as I read your arguments. I struggled with this too, but try making the image size and note sizes bigger when you upload into Blogger.
ReplyDelete