Sketchplanations - A weekly explanation in a sketch

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Explaining the world one sketch at a time

The Droste effect

The Droste effect is an endless picture-in-picture—a part of the picture contains the whole picture, which contains the picture, which contains the picture, and on. Most of us are likely familiar with it from the fun visual effect you often see when sharing your screen on a video call, which contains the video call where you're sharing your screen, on which is the video call where... Always entertaining. Google calls it an infinity mirror. The name derives from a Dutch brand of cocoa powder, Droste, where the classic advert was a picture of a nurse carrying a tray with a box of the cocoa powder, with the picture of the woman on it carrying the tray with a box of the cocoa... Articles about the Droste effect often mention the amazing M.C. Escher's Print gallery, a picture without beginning or end.…The Droste effect is an endless picture-in-picture—a part of the picture contains the whole picture, which contains the picture, which contains the picture, and on. Most of us are likely familiar with it from the fun visual effect you often see when sharing your screen on a video call, which contains the video call where you're sharing your screen, on which is the video call where... Always entertaining. Google calls it an infinity mirror. The name derives from a Dutch brand of cocoa powder, Droste, where the classic advert was a picture of a nurse carrying a tray with a box of the cocoa powder, with the picture of the woman on it carrying the tray with a box of the cocoa... Articles about the Droste effect often mention the amazing M.C. Escher's Print gallery, a picture without beginning or end.

27 Aug 2023

Chihuahua syndrome

Chihuahua syndrome refers to messy data from variations in spelling or input—Chihuahua is easy to misspell. The quality of your data matters—errors can creep in anywhere, particularly when people enter data. Garbage in, garbage out. Here's Chris Groskopf quoted in Seeing with Fresh Eyes—Meaning, Space, Data, Truth by Edward Tufte: "There is no worse way to screw up data than to let a single human type it in, without validation. I acquired a complete dog licensing database. Instead of requiring people registering their dog to choose a breed from a list, the system gave dog owners a text field to type into, so this database had 250 spellings of Chihuahua. Even the best tools can't save messy data. Beware of human-entered data." —Chris Groskopf Capitals, spaces, misspellings, hyphens, numbers stored as text, numbers entered as letters (I, O), accents, straight/curly apostrophes, dates out of order, languages, dialects, abbreviations, and more are all routes for misleading your analysis. Spend time with your data. The name The chihuahua syndrome is from Edward Tufte. Adding these terms below to help anyone searching for the sketch ;o) che hua hua, che-hua-hua, che-wara, chee-hua-hua, cheehuahua, chehuahua, chehaha, chehawa, chewawa, chihaha, chihuahua, chihuawa, chiwawa, chiehuaua...…Chihuahua syndrome refers to messy data from variations in spelling or input—Chihuahua is easy to misspell. The quality of your data matters—errors can creep in anywhere, particularly when people enter data. Garbage in, garbage out. Here's Chris Groskopf quoted in Seeing with Fresh Eyes—Meaning, Space, Data, Truth by Edward Tufte: "There is no worse way to screw up data than to let a single human type it in, without validation. I acquired a complete dog licensing database. Instead of requiring people registering their dog to choose a breed from a list, the system gave dog owners a text field to type into, so this database had 250 spellings of Chihuahua. Even the best tools can't save messy data. Beware of human-entered data." —Chris Groskopf Capitals, spaces, misspellings, hyphens, numbers stored as text, numbers entered as letters (I, O), accents, straight/curly apostrophes, dates out of order, languages, dialects, abbreviations, and more are all routes for misleading your analysis. Spend time with your data. The name The chihuahua syndrome is from Edward Tufte. Adding these terms below to help anyone searching for the sketch ;o) che hua hua, che-hua-hua, che-wara, chee-hua-hua, cheehuahua, chehuahua, chehaha, chehawa, chewawa, chihaha, chihuahua, chihuawa, chiwawa, chiehuaua...

20 Aug 2023

Dark patterns

Dark patterns are when people design interfaces intending to deceive or trick. Sadly we are all familiar with these. They're everywhere. It could be the free trial that unexpectedly led to a subscription or the subscription that was easy to sign up for but had to be canceled by mailing in a letter. Or it could be an outward attempt at giving control over privacy but with options so confusing as to do the opposite. Perhaps you tried to adjust cookie preferences on a news website but could only find a button to 'Accept all' after editing your preferences—grrrr! Tricking people like this into sharing more information than intended has come to be known as Privacy Zuckering. Remember popups that could only be closed once you found a tiny 'x' that moved around the screen? I recently wanted to pause a subscription only to be told it would invalidate all the accumulated unused credits I'd paid for (I'm still paying). The Pudding published a great analysis of unsubscribing from online services. At times this may be unintentional—there's naturally less incentive to work on great account closing and unsubscribe experiences than on signing up. The example in the sketch was a real one I experienced (I wish I'd grabbed a screenshot) from an airline website where the designers buried the option not to buy insurance within the country select list. And they're not just online. Sneaky casinos employ design in the physical world for their gain, such as removing references to time passing, such as clocks or windows, using mazelike navigation and the continual winning sounds of jingling coins. "Dark patterns" was coined by Harry Brignull and documented at the Deceptive patterns site and now a book.…Dark patterns are when people design interfaces intending to deceive or trick. Sadly we are all familiar with these. They're everywhere. It could be the free trial that unexpectedly led to a subscription or the subscription that was easy to sign up for but had to be canceled by mailing in a letter. Or it could be an outward attempt at giving control over privacy but with options so confusing as to do the opposite. Perhaps you tried to adjust cookie preferences on a news website but could only find a button to 'Accept all' after editing your preferences—grrrr! Tricking people like this into sharing more information than intended has come to be known as Privacy Zuckering. Remember popups that could only be closed once you found a tiny 'x' that moved around the screen? I recently wanted to pause a subscription only to be told it would invalidate all the accumulated unused credits I'd paid for (I'm still paying). The Pudding published a great analysis of unsubscribing from online services. At times this may be unintentional—there's naturally less incentive to work on great account closing and unsubscribe experiences than on signing up. The example in the sketch was a real one I experienced (I wish I'd grabbed a screenshot) from an airline website where the designers buried the option not to buy insurance within the country select list. And they're not just online. Sneaky casinos employ design in the physical world for their gain, such as removing references to time passing, such as clocks or windows, using mazelike navigation and the continual winning sounds of jingling coins. "Dark patterns" was coined by Harry Brignull and documented at the Deceptive patterns site and now a book.

13 Aug 2023

The isolation effect

The isolation effect is our tendency to remember an item that stands out in some way from a set of otherwise similar items—you might easily guess, for example, which name we are more likely to remember from a list of Tom, Terry, Angelica, Theo and Tyler. When presenting information, the isolation effect is practical if you wish to draw attention to specific items. By standardising the presentation of other items in a list, maybe by muting the colours, making them the same size, or removing features that stand out, you can draw people's attention and improve people's memory of your chosen items. The isolation effect is standard in web design by using distinctiveness: red notification bubbles on a set of otherwise homogenous apps, a "most popular" plan more prominent than the other options, or a Call-To-Action (CTA) button in a contrasting colour. The isolation effect is also known as the Von Restorff effect after the German psychiatrist Hedwig von Restorff. See, for example, Hunt, R.R. The subtlety of distinctiveness: What von Restorff really did. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 2, 105–112 (1995) for a summary of Von Restorff's most cited paper on the effect.…The isolation effect is our tendency to remember an item that stands out in some way from a set of otherwise similar items—you might easily guess, for example, which name we are more likely to remember from a list of Tom, Terry, Angelica, Theo and Tyler. When presenting information, the isolation effect is practical if you wish to draw attention to specific items. By standardising the presentation of other items in a list, maybe by muting the colours, making them the same size, or removing features that stand out, you can draw people's attention and improve people's memory of your chosen items. The isolation effect is standard in web design by using distinctiveness: red notification bubbles on a set of otherwise homogenous apps, a "most popular" plan more prominent than the other options, or a Call-To-Action (CTA) button in a contrasting colour. The isolation effect is also known as the Von Restorff effect after the German psychiatrist Hedwig von Restorff. See, for example, Hunt, R.R. The subtlety of distinctiveness: What von Restorff really did. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 2, 105–112 (1995) for a summary of Von Restorff's most cited paper on the effect.

6 Aug 2023

Point positive

Point positive is a rafting term for agreeing in advance to point towards the safe way out of danger rather than towards the dangers themselves. So, should a raft get stuck on a rock in a rapid, pointing positive would be pointing away from the obstacles to help a raft behind navigate through safely. Or should there be an unintentional swimmer, pointing positive is pointing towards the safest channel to steer towards. Like "Don't fix the blame, fix the problem," point positive is a valuable metaphor and reminder that it's often less helpful to dwell on difficulties and problems than to direct others and our energies toward positive ways forward and solutions. Also see: It's easier to give privacy than to find it…Point positive is a rafting term for agreeing in advance to point towards the safe way out of danger rather than towards the dangers themselves. So, should a raft get stuck on a rock in a rapid, pointing positive would be pointing away from the obstacles to help a raft behind navigate through safely. Or should there be an unintentional swimmer, pointing positive is pointing towards the safest channel to steer towards. Like "Don't fix the blame, fix the problem," point positive is a valuable metaphor and reminder that it's often less helpful to dwell on difficulties and problems than to direct others and our energies toward positive ways forward and solutions. Also see: It's easier to give privacy than to find it

30 Jul 2023

Orbit

It's mindblowing to me to think at any moment, over 6,000 satellites are whipping around the Earth at terrific speeds and somehow not drifting off into space or crashing into Earth. How does this work? An orbit around Earth is a delicate balance between the momentum of a satellite traveling at speed parallel to the Earth's surface and the constant tug of gravity towards the Earth. If the satellite travels too slowly, gravity wins, eventually pulling the satellite back to Earth. If it travels too fast, gravity isn't strong enough to hold it, and the satellite will shoot off into space. But at just the right speed—which depends on its distance from Earth—gravity will pull the satellite towards Earth, but the satellite's speed ensures it will keep missing and instead continue its journey orbiting around Earth. In this case, gravity acts as a centripetal force, a force acting towards the centre, enabling satellites to stay in orbit. Newton had a thought experiment known as Newton's Cannon where he imagined firing a cannonball off a high mountain at different velocities and what the resultant trajectories would be. Most orbits are slightly elliptical or oval-shaped. For example, the elliptical nature of the Moon's orbit gives us the joys of things like supermoons.…It's mindblowing to me to think at any moment, over 6,000 satellites are whipping around the Earth at terrific speeds and somehow not drifting off into space or crashing into Earth. How does this work? An orbit around Earth is a delicate balance between the momentum of a satellite traveling at speed parallel to the Earth's surface and the constant tug of gravity towards the Earth. If the satellite travels too slowly, gravity wins, eventually pulling the satellite back to Earth. If it travels too fast, gravity isn't strong enough to hold it, and the satellite will shoot off into space. But at just the right speed—which depends on its distance from Earth—gravity will pull the satellite towards Earth, but the satellite's speed ensures it will keep missing and instead continue its journey orbiting around Earth. In this case, gravity acts as a centripetal force, a force acting towards the centre, enabling satellites to stay in orbit. Newton had a thought experiment known as Newton's Cannon where he imagined firing a cannonball off a high mountain at different velocities and what the resultant trajectories would be. Most orbits are slightly elliptical or oval-shaped. For example, the elliptical nature of the Moon's orbit gives us the joys of things like supermoons.

23 Jul 2023

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