Interactive Graphics

I thought that Quealy made some good points when he said that some graphics could contain too much information. But, at the same times, that's one of the benefits with online interactive graphics, the very fact that you can do that. You're no longer limited by space or colors or even 2 dimensions. Sure, sometimes it can get overwhelming. But, with information and statistics becoming more and more easily available for journalists, I really think there's no reason why we shouldn't utilize all of that information to give our readers the most information possible.

This, of course, has limitations, and the journalist needs to be aware of what information is just plain useless. For instance, if you're making an interactive map of Iraq, marking points where battles or bombings have occurred, relevant information might include how many people were killed, the time of day, etc. but we really don't need to know say that it was 74 degrees outside at that moment. There has to be a line drawn somewhere between information and clutter, and the interactive flash graphic creator, like any other designer needs to be aware of the attention spans of their audience.