
Mistakes, we’ve drawn a few (2019) - davidbarker
https://medium.economist.com/mistakes-weve-drawn-a-few-8cdd8a42d368
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geofft
I think the dog one ("Mistake: Forcing a relationship by cherry-picking
scales") was actually fine for a very specific reason: assuming dogs are of
roughly constant density, weight is proportional to volume, which has a cubic
relationship to a linear dimension like collar size. Therefore, if you have an
increase of, say, ~7% (42 to 45) in your linear variable, you want an increase
of 1.07^3 in your volumetric variable... which works out as 18 to ~22.1, which
would make the two lines overlap even more. You don't want a 7% increase on
both scales.

Intuitively, there _should_ be a fairly tight correlation between size and
weight, so overlapping them isn't misleading.

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enriquto
> Intuitively, there should be a fairly tight correlation between size and
> weight, so overlapping them isn't misleading.

Or maybe not, and tiny, thick-necked pugs are becoming more popular and this
trend should be reflected somehow!

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geofft
Wouldn't that be reflected in the graph (as rendered originally) if so?

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dang
Discussed at the time:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19508729](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19508729)

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thunderbong
Fantastic article. Explains in such great detail about what goes into making a
good chart from data (and what mistakes even experienced people can make!)

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BetaDeltaAlpha
Does anyone find The Economist mirroring it's Medium blog at
medium.economist.com a little roundabout?

Is there an infrastructural or SEO reason to do this?

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tobyjsullivan
Mirroring would imply it is being served from somewhere other than Medium,
right? Is that the case or is this just a custom domain (medium.economist.com)
pointing to their Medium blog? I believe custom domains are a common practice
for larger brands.

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inetknght
> _is this just a custom domain (medium.economist.com) pointing to their
> Medium blog? I believe custom domains are a common practice for larger
> brands._

I wouldn't label it "common practice for larger brands".

I would label it "common SEO abuse by larger brands".

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chipotle_coyote
How is a custom domain "SEO abuse"? I'm really not understanding what
nefarious intent you're accusing the Economist of here.

