Global+Visualization+of+Google+Searches

Global Visualization of Google Searches (might not run in safari) by Martin Krzywinksi



The project is headed by Martin Krzywinski who is a Bioinformatics Scientist by nature. In his website, he has several information visualization contents like “Genome Informatics”, “Deadly Genomes” or something as popular as “Lexical Analysis of 2008 US Presidential and Vice-Presidential Debates”.

This information visualization talks about the google searches made around the world with the corresponding language used to conduct those searches. The web application allows you to ‘spin’ it as you would with an actual globe and vertical bars–that serve as the intensity– rise from locations corresponding to where the searches were made. The vertical bars as color coded depending on the language used.

The application greatly gives an impressive feedback for all users both for those who need this information and for those who do not. Having the ability to study the globe “as a globe” adds more to the interactivity of the application and it makes learning and digesting the information interesting and easy. Just by looking at the article title and having the ability to ‘spin the globe‘, any user will instantly know how to use the application and how to understand the information. If one were to describe this web application with just single words, it would be: “simple”, “straightforward”, “intuitive”.

Considering that this website serves as his own personal website, he didn’t have any specific reason nor intended audience for making this visualization. Another hint is that, this article of his is classified in his site under “Fun + Amusement”. From a web user’s standpoint, it is interesting to know about this information and have it visualized for easier digestion. Not to mention, acquiring and aggregating reliable google information is difficult to find nowadays. He provided the “data” for the world to openly interpret.

Analyzing this specific visualization further, we can notice certain patterns and derive information and facts based on the data visualized. His article lists some noticeable patterns that aided him with some conclusions. For example, he claims to have tracked down illegal mexican aliens in the US based on google searches in spanish. The second example he has is that chinese occupation “is overestimated in the US” since his visualization shows that there are only two to three towns that do google searches in chinese. After all, he is drawing those conclusions based on the statistical data he has. Nevertheless, this serves both his strength and his weakness.

One severe downside I noticed is the credibility of the website, the information or the visualization itself. As a Filipino myself, I took the liberty of spinning the globe to philippines and tried to see what would come up. On certain parts of the country you would see varying heights of the bars which reflect the activity and intensity of those areas. Problem is though, the bars are colored as ‘light red/pink’. In the legend below, it’s classified under either Dutch or Norwegian which neither Philippines speaks (Tagalog=primary; English=secondary). I personally know this as a fact. Going around the site more, it made me realize that this article, visualization, and information is residing in someone’s personal website. This means that the information this website provides is not standard, proven nor verified even if the author is of highest recognition. This also reflects his findings as just opinions rather than concluding them as facts. In his first example: pinpointing illegal mexican immigrants through the US map is highly premature to conclude. Not all mexican-speaking individuals are illegal aliens. In turn, some illegal aliens might choose to search with the english language. Same applies to his second example about chinese residents in the US and their population. His conclusion becomes not only insensitive, but also immature, thus it only reflects his own opinion.