Chart Wars

I found this very interesting video of Alex Lundry on Blip.tv (Conservative Political Pollster, Microtargeter, Data-Miner, and Data Visualizer according to his twitter account), talking about the political power of data visualization which he calls Chart Wars.

"A funny thing happened during this summer's health care debate: a chart that purported to show the organizational structure of the Democratic health care reform proposal took over the media cycle and triggered a partisan visualization volley.

Since then, the original chart has frequently been used as a provocative protest sign and is now the subject of a congressional investigation.

What was it that made this data visualization so powerful and politically potent? How can your organization or your cause harness data visualization as a messaging medium? With these health care chart wars as a backdrop, this presentation will show you how to be a smart consumer of data visualizations and infographics"

Propaganda Critic

Aaron Delwiche's site Propaganda Critic, was created to continue the pioneering work of the Institute for Propaganda Analysis, which promoted critical propaganda analysis from 1937-1942. The site, which has been online since 1994, provides an overview of propaganda techniques and gives historical and recent examples. There's also a page of links to classic propaganda films hosted on the Internet Archive.

via Social Design Notes