Data visualization: Stop making charts when a table is better — Quartz
▻https://qz.com/1107993/data-visualization-stop-making-charts-when-a-table-is-better
▻https://qzprod.files.wordpress.com/2017/10/chartnotneeded.jpg?quality=80&strip=all&w=1600
Charts are cool. But they are not always necessary, or even helpful. I am here to make a case for the humble, effective table.
While the use of tables to display data in rows and columns goes back, at least, to the 2nd century, the chart is a relatively new innovation. Bar, line, and pie charts, the workhorses of data visualization, were all invented by Scottish political economist William Playfair at the turn of the 18th century. Playfair thought his charts were a particularly excellent way to show changes of magnitude over time. For example, in one of the earliest known charts, Playfair brilliantly used a line chart to show the evolution of England’s balance of trade.