Posts tagged Infographic
[Infographic] How the App Stores “Really” Stack Up
Apr 9th
If you liken app stores to race horses, Apple is the biggest, baddest thoroughbred in town. Google Play is a fine specimen with some distinct qualities but has a lot of work to do in the practice yard before catching up. Everything else is an also-ran. Windows Phone has been growing rapidly, increasing from 40,000 apps in Nov. 2011 to 70,000 at the most recent count. Then there is BlackBerry App World. For all of Research In Motion’s troubles, its app repository is tied with Windows Phone at 70,000, which includes 15,000 specifically designed for the BlackBerry PlayBook. There are no tablet apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace, mostly because there is no Windows tablet (well, one worth anything).
German BlackBerry blog BlogBerry.de sent us over an infographic (through its content promotion specialist BlueGrass Interactive) breaking down the “reality” of the native app stores. It quotes RIM VP of developer relations Alec Saunders as saying 13% of BlackBerry developers have made $100,000 or more off their apps. We have heard this song and dance before. Take a look at the infographic below and let us know in the comments what you think of the BlackBerry App World, its quality of apps and whether or not it is a wise business decision to build any apps for the BlackBerry platform these days.
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[Infographic] How Much is That Tweet Really Worth?
Apr 6th
The good folks at Backupify.com have put together this interesting infographic this week that attempts to calculate what an individual Tweet, Facebook user and other social media elements are actually worth in dollars and cents. And perhaps to no one’s surprise, the most expensive item is an individual review on Yelp. This was done by dividing total company revenue by the amount of pieces of content. Given that many of us are paid per blog post, there is some method to this metric.
Also not surprisingly, given its anticipated valuation, each Facebook user is worth more than $100, the most of the nine services examined.
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While you can certainly take issue with the specific calculations, it is an interesting way to look at these nine social media sites and what they are worth.
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[Infographic] Every Day Popular Sites Still Serve Up Malware
Apr 3rd
Yes, you read that correctly. According to Barracuda Labs, two out of the top 25,000 domains (at least top of Alexa’s rankings) serve up some tasty and annoying malware to their visitors. Hopefully, this is unintentional and the result of some compromise. The lab rats found that more than 10 million folks were exposed to exploits in February, and almost every day there was a new compromised website. The top-ranked domains that served malicious content spanned across 18 different countries, demonstrating that this problem has no geographic barrier. Making matters worse, almost all of the compromised sites were at least a year old, and half were more than five years old. This indicates that attackers use well-established, long-lived websites for their drive-by download campaigns.
The researchers used an automated script to bring up a series of URLs inside a virtual Windows VM and observe what happens to its OS, plug-ins, and other browser settings. Once the site is visited, the VM’s network traffic is monitored to see what malware has been placed on it.
On the link on their blog post is more information on their methodology and the complete infographic, which we have truncated here in the interests of readability.
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[Infographic] A Look Back at UNIVAC
Apr 2nd
It was the first computer – ever – and it was turned on in March of 1951 for the U.S. Census Bureau. The UNIVAC, or Universal Automatic Computer, was big: an entire room, filled with more than 5,000 vacuum tubes and consuming 150 kW of power. It operated at a mere 2000 instructions per second. (By comparison, the average laptop today routinely handles about 100,000 million instructions every second.)
The UNIVAC had Big Bertha printers, too, that could print 600 lines of type every minute on form-fed paper, and weighed in at 800 pounds. Thanks to the folks at Royal Pingdom, who have put together this infographic.
The UNIVAC’s big claim to fame: It was the first computer used to predict a U.S. election: UNIVAC said at 8:30 p.m. EST that Eisenhower would win 43 states and 438 electoral votes: he actually won 39 states and 442 votes. Wired had the story several years ago here. CBS news, who had hired the programmers, never aired the prediction, however.
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[Infographic] Social Media Security Basics
Mar 29th
If you are part of your company’s IT organization, chances are you wish you would have had this infographic that explains some of the basics about social media security a lot sooner.
With lots of celebrities and ordinary people getting their accounts compromised, there are several basic strategies that can make you more secure. And we aren’t talking about crafting stronger passwords, although that will certainly help matters. Here are some of the more important issues, including the top Facebook exploits and some simple strategies to make your social media activities safer.
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Thanks to the folks at Veracode for posting this summary on their blog.
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Inbound Marketing: Some Tips &Stats via Slideshare & Infographic
Mar 27th
Inbound marketing is serious business and like any form of marketing things must be done right. I hope the information shared today can help you begin creating an effective inbound marketing campaign. Below we have two Slidehares and an infographic for you. The first Slideshare is by Marketo with tips on creating a better inbound [...]
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[Infographic]: International Cloud Computing Policies
Mar 21st
Small businesses are learning how to leverage the power of cloud computing, and loving it. With the decreasing costs of cloud computing, and its rising capabilities, it’s no wonder business owners are flocking to this new software. However, some businesses are still skeptical about integrating cloud computing, due to uncertainties in privacy and data protection. This is especially true If you’re considering supporting a widespread field service population that crosses geographic boundaries. Do you know the various privacy and data security laws for Germany, for example?
Well, you could hire a bunch of lawyers, but you could also check out our infographic that summarizes the best and worst places to have a cloud-based business.
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Thanks to ClickSoftware for preparing this infographic.
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[Infographic] The Hype Versus Reality of HTML5 Deployment
Mar 21st
What do we really know about HTML5? It is a Web based standard with the potential to create cross-platform apps that can run anywhere, everywhere. The key word here is potential. HTML5 is evolving and there is little doubt that it will be a major component of the future. That does not yet mean that developers have wholly embraced it.
The native frameworks and (gasp) Flash still dominate much of what is run on Web and mobile applications. Flash is on its last legs but the fact of the matter is that it is still one of the prime standards for many of the applications we interact with on a daily basis. It is not like we flip a switch and all of a sudden everything is HTML5 based. Below we take a look at an infographic that examines some of the facts around HTML5 hype versus the current real world landscape.
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For faithful ReadWriteMobile readers that are used to checking in here to see the latest developments on what is happening with the HTML5 ecosystem, this infographic is going to make you a little angry. Even though I, as am objective reporter, am relatively platform and standards agnostic, it even angered me a little bit.
Anybody that knows my opinion on infographics, I diligently fact check them to make sure they are not misleading or blatantly lying. While some of the information on this particular infographic is a little dated, the general theme is spot on: yes, HTML5 is still in adoption phase and is outpaced by the native frameworks.
While this is true, the signs of change are in the air. Even Adobe admitted that mobile Flash is a dead fish and the last instance of it to be released will be run on Android Ice Cream Sandwich devices. Adobe itself is moving to create HTML5 and other Web-based tools for desktop and mobile applications.
The source of the infographic is a Washington-state based Zipline Games, makers of the Moai Cloud service for games. Moai Cloud 1.0 will be released March 23rd. The CEO of Zipline is Todd Hooper who has been fairly outspoken that HTML5 will not be the future for Web or mobile games.
“HTML5 was not created with games in mind and the working group …had no members from game companies.” Bingo.
— Todd Hooper (@toddhooper) November 2, 2011
Hooper does have a point. When it comes to performance of applications, games set the benchmark. At this point, HTML5 is just not ready for games. Does that mean it is not the future? That is difficult to ascertain. Say what you want about standards bodies and their actual usefulness, but HTML5 is certainly not ready for the official stamp of approval. Layered sound is a major issue and frame rates tend to lag behind other standards. While Sencha and appMobi among others attempt to improve HTML5 performance, game developers struggle to make do with what the standard allows.
Check out the infographic below and let us know what you think about the future of HTML5 in games in the comments. Also stay tuned for a Q&A with Hooper coming early next week.
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Why Your Infographic Is Evil (And Three Ways To Fix It)
Mar 21st
Blogger’s confession: I can spend a couple of hours interviewing sources and crafting a post several hundred words long and get a couple of thousand hits.
Or I can write a pithy introduction, repurpose an infographic that has already appeared on several other sites and most likely was created by a public relations firm or a company looking to push a product and service and end up doubling or tripling those traffic numbers.
I’ve done both. But I’m not necessarily proud of succumbing to the infographic trend. I’m not bashing infographics. Some of my best friends are graphic artists who design infographics that are eye catching, smart and tell stories better than my words ever could. But this latest visual Internet fad of telling almost every story with a dense infographic is something that I’m hoping will soon be played out.
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“We are becoming a society of hyperactive, yammering idiots.” – Gail Granger
And, barring that, I hope it will at least be done better.
“We are becoming numb to infographics. Not long ago, I saw infographics in my newsfeed as an informational ‘treat’ because I knew the author had used the medium only because it most effectively displayed the information,” said Jasmine Bina of JB Communications in New York and Los Angeles. “But now that people have realized the traffic-generating powers of these things, every dumb report with an ounce of usable info is puffed into these massive images.”
Gail Granger, who runs a communications firm in Winnipeg, was more blunt in her assessment of the infographic craze.
“We used to have an attention span of about 30-seconds – the length of a commercial. Now it’s down to about five,” she said. “We are becoming a society of hyperactive, yammering idiots.”
Making Informed Infographic Decisions
Stephanie Yonus of Big Red Pin in Edison, N.J. “hates” infographics but still gets her team to work on creating them.
“I can understand why readers like them so much, and in my position I have to follow the trends,” she said. “Even when I can’t stand them.”
So until the trend dies, we’ve compiled a list of do’s, don’ts and best practices for creating and using infographics, whether you’re a blogger looking for content or a public relations firm looking to get your client’s message out.
Accuracy Counts
Like many readers who have gotten used to seeing lots of infographics on the Web, Yonus said the first thing she does when she sees one now is scan to the bottom and check the source. By habit, bloggers and journalists should do this, and if they can’t verify the information, they should hold off publication until they can.
But readers need to be cautious too, because not every person who publishes an infographic will do that, and many can be loaded with outdated information or information taken out of context.
“The biggest con is the ability to make an accurate representation of the data. I’ve seen visualizations that are pretty but not accurate which is never a good thing,” said Ali Asage, CEO of Boost Labs, a company that specializes in data visualization. “The other con is not being clear with visualization which can lead to too many interpretations of the data.”
A Picture May Be Worth 1,000 words, But Sometimes That’s Too Many
Bina says people are too often using infographics to turn nothing into something. Padding content may hook readers in initially, but it won’t keep them on your page once they realize there’s no depth there.
“Sometimes things are better left said, as in words,” Bina said. “If you’re a writer, don’t succumb to the allure of an infographic when you know deep down inside that one or two sentences will convey the message just as well, if not better.”
Bite Size Portions
Increasingly, firms take a topic, find loads of data supporting their point of view on that topic, and then cram it all into a single inforgraphic that stretches like a skyscraper across a blog post or Web page.
“The best infographics condense their data points into a digestible size, or into separate ‘chunks’ of graphical data,” said Todd Defren, principal of SHIFT Communications. “It would be nice to see infographics served up in separate chunks of 3-5 graphics, so journalists and bloggers can decide what aspects of the data best suit their readership.”
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[INFOGRAPHIC] How Much Does A One-Second Page Load Delay Cost?
Mar 19th
Google has long been telling us how long it took to perform whatever search we sent its way. That little note may seem self-congratulatory to the average Internet user, but it’s vitally important.
Slowing that number by just 4/10ths of a second, for example, would cut 8 million searches from Google’s daily total of 3 billion. If its pages took one second longer to load, Amazon, for example, could lose as much as $1.6 billion in annual revenue.
These and other findings are included in a smart new infographic (see below) from OnlineGraduatePrograms that sheds light on the need for speed when it comes to Web page design. All of this emphasis on instant gratification comes at a time when the Internet is trending towards being more visual, meaning Web designers need to find ways to create image-heavy sites that still load quickly.
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The chart also shows we remain impatient once we click through that top result Google gave us: half of us will abandon a Web page that takes more than four seconds to load. The stakes are getting even higher as more traffic moves to mobile devices: 40% of shoppers accessing an e-commerce site with their smartphone give up after just three seconds of waiting for a page to load.
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