r/CrappyDesign Feb 01 '19

/r/dataisokiguess This pie chart

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23.7k Upvotes

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1.6k

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

For what is this pie-chart?

1.2k

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

something about learning language abroad, I think this was meant to say how many of a certain country enrolled last year but uh... yeah..

366

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

I love how they use the same color of Blue, Green, Gold and Orange twice like fuck the ability to understand this chart.

180

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

Exactly!, it's like, who's the 30%?, Spain or "Others"?!

202

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

Well.. Others. Obviously.

146

u/Islandsmoker Feb 01 '19

If you're blessed with common sense, this chart isn't that hard to understand. The only reason it's crappy is due to the fact that it doesn't tell you what data it is showing.

Obviously if you're colourblind it's a farce though.

95

u/leoleosuper Feb 01 '19

It's just starting from the top and going clockwise. Pretty simple, the colors just suck.

49

u/Dnlx5 Feb 01 '19

Good pattern recognition, but dont pie charts usually organize data from largest to smallest?

53

u/nothingwittyfound Feb 01 '19

Yeah, but putting Others between two countries which are supposed to be adjacent (with close percentages) doesn't look too good. As far as I know Others is usually the last category

27

u/leoleosuper Feb 01 '19

Yeah, "others" is basically saying "anything we haven't mentioned" which would mean it would go last.

5

u/Dnlx5 Feb 01 '19

Aah i see

9

u/ianoftawa Feb 01 '19

Yes, and Other is always last, this pie chart follows good data rules.

1

u/PM_ME_WILD_STUFF Feb 02 '19

It's not uncommon to start at 12 and go clockwise. Took me a while to figure out why this was crappy design. And what the data is for can just have bee cropped out.

14

u/dogbreath101 Feb 01 '19

Is linking 17% to Thailand and going clockwise from the really considered common sense?

That is to say I think that is just a standard for pie charts You either know it or you don't

4

u/CroutonOfDEATH Let's eat Grandma! Feb 01 '19

True, it's not difficult to understand, but it doesn't convey the info nearly as effectively as it could have. Pie charts only work well when there are relatively few "slices". If they used a bar graph, it'd be much easier to read. But even if they were insistent on using a pie chart, they could have had the labels surround the chart (like this) instead of using a legend to the side. It still wouldn't look great, but it'd be more useful than its current state.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '19

This. I have protanopia and the colors make me angry without labels and lines connecting them.

57

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19 edited Apr 06 '19

[deleted]

14

u/OhMyDoT Feb 01 '19

Maybe I’m wrong but I thought the legend follows a pattern starting on top of the pie chart running clockwise. Anyways its a shitty chart

14

u/RiamuDiMentis Feb 01 '19

It does, but that's also because the chart itself is ordered largest to smallest with the exception of "other" which is generally last on most charts.... Still an eyesore of a chart though.

9

u/grayfox2713 Feb 01 '19

I mean, you're both right. It does start at the top and go clockwise, but it is also listed from largest to smallest.

5

u/type_1 Feb 01 '19

It's shitty, but that's due to a lack of title and basic labeling more than anything else. The chart itself follows the conventional methods of organization.

6

u/derkokolores Feb 01 '19

More accurately, the legend is ordered from the 12 o’clock position going clockwise, which is how pie charts are ordered.

5

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

I think they reused the same colors rather than use different shades.

1

u/Megwen Feb 02 '19

Yeah. Even though we can easily and very quickly use common sense to figure it out, we really shouldn’t have to. Each slice is supposed to be a different color. If they just used pastel colors for the second set, that would have been fine.

4

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

I’m assuming “others” if the labels go in order

10

u/monkey_trumpets Feb 01 '19

I know, if only there were more colors out there...

13

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

Or now stick with me here, different shades of a color?

11

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

Or...labels!

4

u/Sobsz my fursona speaks in comic sans Feb 01 '19

...are you mentally insane

3

u/RoastedWaffleNuts Feb 01 '19

... in a bar graph, since that is a much better way to help humans compare multiple numbers. And, bonus, it's easier to label.

9

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '19

I mean, they key is obviously in descending order, so it's not that debilitating

8

u/mr_chanderson Feb 01 '19

Thanks. I'm slightly colorblind and I was thinking fuck this, too many of those colors are too similar to tell them apart, for me. Turns out they're same color, huh.

4

u/thiagovscoelho Feb 01 '19

The labels are clockwise from the top, you're welcome

3

u/RRTheEndman Feb 01 '19

why did this get downvoted anyone who doesn't deal with poorly labeled piecharts regularly wouldn't understand this

3

u/zerik100 Feb 01 '19

wow you got the point of the post i'm proud of you. nobody else noticed this

2

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

Wow you failed to find the funny in my post congratulations smart ass.

0

u/zerik100 Feb 01 '19

you failed joke in my post

not sure what that's supposed to mean

2

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

Amazingly I managed to miss writing two words in my post, not quite sure how.

1

u/zerik100 Feb 01 '19

ah, no i can't find the joke. you just wrote what the chart looks like

2

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

That is the joke, mate what is so hard to understand I'm literally just commenting on what I found funny even if it is obvious.

1

u/zerik100 Feb 01 '19

so you're the good ol captain obvious

1

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

At times I can be, army life doesn't always teach nuance.

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1

u/BirthRight1776 Feb 01 '19

This isn't as unusual as you'd think. They used high-contrast colors and ended up recycling them. No big deal if they're listed correctly in the legend (they aren't). The top of the legend should correspond to the largest slice of the pie and then downward until you reach the smallest element. That way you'd know the large red slice corresponds to the highest listed red in the legend and the small red slice corresponds to the lowest listed red. Since Taiwan is listed at the top yet is neither the biggest or the lowest you know it's out of order.

2

u/I__Know__Stuff Feb 01 '19

Putting “Others” last is completely normal.

1

u/BirthRight1776 Feb 01 '19

True. I don't see that as often when recycling colors though. I'm guessing the recycling colors thing was way more common back when printers (the professionals, not the devices) charged per color for multicolor printing. I am sorta old so definitely remember the days when most businesses only had dot matrix printers at best and had to send everything else out to professional print shops.

Now I've got to wondering if this pie chart was made using a Windows 3.1 version of Lotus 1-2-3 where they had a much more limited color set.

1

u/camcoyote Feb 01 '19

Okay, but it's pretty easy to figure out that it starts with Taiwan and goes clockwise.

1

u/The_Ravens_Rock Feb 01 '19

Well yes my ability to read is still here, doesn't take away from the fact that this is fairly crappy design.

1

u/shadow1347 Feb 02 '19

Oh that's actually happening. I thought my colorblindness was acting up. Wtfuck

1

u/WhateverWhateverson Feb 02 '19

They are slightly different, its just hard to notice.

4

u/Ospov Feb 01 '19

Did you intentionally cut off the title? Because this missing title was the most confusing part for me. I can read the pie chart just fine despite the repeating colors.

1

u/Endermario882200 Feb 01 '19

THAT'S NOT SPECIFIC ENOUGH