Four short links: 12 Feb 2009

Two links on visualization and two on life:

1. Myth of the Concentration Oasis -- Vaughan of Mind Hacks takes on the trendy notion that the Internet is turning us into brainless dullards who are unable to focus on any subject for longer than a 15s TV commercial. "The trouble is, it's plainly rubbish, and you just have to spend time with some low tech communities to see this is the case."
2. UUorld -- gorgeous map-based visual analytics environment for Mac OS X. Lovely to see something step beyond the "throw it onto a Google Map", which has become commonplace.
3. Why I Can't Afford Cheap -- great story about an octogenarian talking about her prized possessions. (via Titine's delicious stream)
4. Visualization Trends for the Noosphere (Jon Udell) -- thoughtful commentary on what's needed to make data visualization as simple as email. Viz is an incredibly powerful tool for translating data into understanding, but it's currently too damn hard to "mix the paint" (Udell's great term for the data hacking to convert, fix, etc. the data before they can be used). (via Titine's delicious stream)