iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 01/05/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Bonus Days :) I realized that there were a few variables I had not pulled for charts from @boardgamegeek.com A #dataviz of standard deviations within games, and one of recommended age Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 30/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 30 - Global Health Data Exchange Shortly after the pandemic, there was a survey around disruptions to learning during the pandemic. While one may think that the divide was country-based, the urban/rural split was worse. #dataviz code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 29/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 29 - Monochrome @boardgamegeek.com users are polled on what the ideal number of players are for different games. This #dataviz shows results, with some solo gamers popping in for certain games (and a lot of 3-4 player games). Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 28/04/2026

I think the first time I really sensed the power of a #dataviz was when I visited The Morgan Library, saw something that looked like a circle with dots on either side of them... and realized it was Galileo Galilei's observations of Jupiter. A piece of paper that literally changed our worldview.

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 28/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 28 - Modeling It is possible to show the Bayesian model #dataviz that undergirds @boardgamegeek.com ratings. Each line represents the average of user ratings while it amasses more votes. One game is on track to eventual #1! Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Ansgar Wolsing @ansgarw.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

What if there was a federal election in Germany next Sunday… … and we included the uncertainty in the data in the chart? The results of every opinion poll come with a margin of error. How can we communicate this uncertainty? #30DayChartChallenge | Day 27 - Animation #dataviz 📊

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 27/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 27 - Animation This bar chart #dataviz gets built year by year of mechanics in @boardgamegeek.com games, showing the increase of mechanics like Solo games over recent years. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Tan G. @tangandhara.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

The real story is the bunching at round numbers of hour and half-hour marks: “Although the four-hour mark is particularly dramatic, qualitatively similar diﬀerences exist at other hour and half-hour marks and, to a lesser extent, at 10- and 15-minute marks” devingpope.com/assets/files...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 26/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 26 - Trend One would think that kickstarter/COVID would be drivers of solo options and mechanics being an increasing part of @boardgamegeek.com games, but it seems as if it has been a slow increase even before then Code for #dataviz in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 25/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 25 - Space Maybe taking a bit literally, but this #dataviz shows the history of @boardgamegeek.com science fiction/space board games, by year published and rating. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel... Help from Claude in creating the starry backdrop

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 24/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 24 - South China Morning Post Inspired by a #dataviz on languages of the world, explored making a Voronoi Tree Cluster for the popularity of top board games, colored by sub category. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 23/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 23 - Seasons When does one play the most @boardgamegeek.com games? I have logged my own plays in the portal for the past few years, so this radial #dataviz shows that I play a bit more in the winter, a bit less in the summer. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 22/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 22 - New Tool This violin #dataviz shows the variation between categories in score (top) and ownership (bottom) of @boardgamegeek.com games. The simplicity of abstract games seems to lower the rating, but increase the ownership. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 21/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 21 - Historical The 'ancient' and 'historical' families allow one to see what time periods @boardgamegeek.com games are set in. This treemap #dataviz separates those out by time period and setting. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Surbhi Bhatia @surbhaai.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

#Day20: Global change How do countries power themselves? Over the last two decades, the world’s electricity mix has been slowly turning green, but not everywhere. Data: @ourworldindata.org #30DayChartChallenge #dataviz #energymix

A tilemap of the world showing how electricity production sources have changed from 2000 to 2024. Each tile contains an area chart indicating the share of fossil fuels (grey), nuclear (yellow), and renewables (green). Across most regions, especially Europe, parts of Latin America, and Africa, renewable energy use has grown. In contrast, several countries in Asia and the Middle East remain dominated by grey, indicating continued dependence on fossil fuels. Nuclear energy (yellow) is visible in a smaller set of countries, notably in Europe and East Asia. Overall, the map highlights a global shift toward renewables, though progress is uneven across regions.

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 20/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 20 - Global Change How has the prevalence of mechanics in @boardgamegeek.com games changed over time? Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Surbhi Bhatia @surbhaai.bsky.social · 19/04/2026

#Day19: Evolution Tried a chart about the evolution of charts! Centuries of trying to understand the world through data and graphics visualised. Data: www.datavis.ca/milestones/ by @datavisfriendly.bsky.social #30DayChartChallenge #dataviz @infobeautiful.bsky.social @datavizsociety.bsky.social

A horizontal timeline chart titled “Viz-ibly, we’ve come a long way: The evolution of maps, graphs and data visualisation,” spanning from 6000 BC to the 2000s. Events are grouped into four rows: Cartography, Statistics & Graphics, Technology, and Other.

In Cartography, milestones are marked such as first known map (6200 BC), first world map (550 BC), latitude/longitude (90 AD), cylindrical projection (1569), first modern atlas (1570), choropleth maps (1819, 1826), London Underground map (1933), GIS (1960), and early weather and disease maps.

In Statistics & Graphics, markers include early star charts and Earth measurements (240–134 BC), planetary diagrams (950), first data graph (1644), bar and line graphs (1786), pie chart (1801), mortality curves (1828), age pyramid (1874), and later methods like Chernoff faces, treemaps, parallel coordinates, ISOTYPE, Grammar of Graphics, and Gapminder.

In Technology, markers include parchment (170 BC), paper (105 AD), movable type (1453), graph paper (1794), lithography (1798), first photograph (1827), first digital computer (1944), Fortran (1957), and S language (1978).

In Other, milestones include color system diagrams (1758), periodic table (1869), and fisheye view (1981).

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 19/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 19 - Evolution As the marketplace decides which games should be created, how have @boardgamegeek.com games 'evolved' over time to survive in an increasingly saturated market? Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 18/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 18 - UNICEF Many of the UNICEF datasets are good for not only outlining important factors but also the limits of knowledge in areas of the world. A double plot of child mortality and uncertainty based on the bounds published. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 18/04/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 - Week 10, showing the proportion of Black Americans in a growing population through Reconstruction Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 17/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 17 - Remake A chart I didn't remake for last year's challenge was the Gapminder dataset. Inspired by the original from Hans Rosling, this remake uses @boardgamegeek.com data to show ratings of board games over time. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 16/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 16 - Causation A forest plot is typically used for meta-analyses to show effects across studies. Here, it shows the difference in rating for @boardgamegeek.com games with (treatment) and without (control) a mechanism. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 15/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 15 - Correlation Some talk about the Cult of the New on @boardgamegeek.com, where something is highly rated just because it is fresh. This has necessitated the use of an alternate rating system based on Bayesian methods. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 14/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 14 - Trade Who do @boardgamegeek.com board game designers trade knowledge with in building top games? This sociogram demonstrates that there are many duads and triads, plus a few more extended networks. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 13/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 13 - Ecosystems Flow diagrams are common tools in ecosystem dynamics to show classification dynamics in a system. This Sankey of @boardgamegeek.com games shows how different types of games show up in complexity tiers. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 12/04/2026

#DuBoisChallenge week 9 - a map comparing the population of Black Americans to the population of other countries, understanding the context of these plates at a World's Fair in Europe. Done in #rstats Code: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 12/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 12 - FlowingData Inspired by the tutorial on gradient ridgelines (flowingdata.com/2025/01/14/d...), this ridgeline shows the comparative ratings (and skew) of @boardgamegeek.com board games across categories. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 11/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 11 - Physical @boardgamegeek.com games come in various shapes and sizes. Are more complex games necessarily in physically bigger boxes? Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Reposted by John Russell

John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 10/04/2026

Reposted image here. Dune was in the original, but Lord of the Rings was caught in an "authors" tag and not book or movie. Thank you @anthonyglinoer.bsky.social for seeing the mistake!

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Nicola Rennie @nrennie.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

Catching up on last week's #TidyTuesday looking at ocean temperatures 🌊 with an experimental heatmap and photography combination 📊 (Maybe also appropriate for Day 11 (Physical) of the #30DayChartChallenge?) #RStats #DataViz #ggplot2

Heatmap showing median daily temperatures for January to December, averaged over 2018 to 2025. Data is recorded at seven different depths, down to 40m. Orange colours indicate higher temperatures, with a triangular pattern observed. Surface temperatures peak in August/September, whereas deeper temperatures peak in October.

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 10/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 10 - Pop Culture Oftentimes, Pop Culture Franchises find their way into @boardgamegeek.com games, either as reskins or with the theme in mind in the beginning. But which franchises are most popular? Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

Bar Graph showing Pop Culture Franchises in top 1,000 games

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 09/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 9 - Wealth A Lorenz Curve is a way of showing income equality through by graphing cumulative percentages of total income against population. For @boardgamegeek.com data, the curve demonstrates 'board game inequity'. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 08/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 8 - Circular This chord diagram shows the relationships between board game mechanics among the top 500 games, showing how many mechanics actually work with each other, with some exceptions (no worker placement/cooperate? hmmm...) Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 07/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 7 - Multiscale Looking at @boardgamegeek.com Board Games using two scales - the ranking within their category, and the ranking overall. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 06/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 6 - Reporters without Borders One would imagine that the safety score and political context score are well correlated - but there are interesting exceptions in both directions. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Mattan S. Ben-Shachar @mattansb.msbstats.info · 05/04/2026

Happy Easter! Although part of the Gregorian calendar, it and the first night of Passover (on the Hebrew calendar) are typically celebrated within 7 days from each other since both dates are defined relative to both the spring equinox (solar year) and the full moon (lunar year)!

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 05/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 5 - experimental I have always loved Florence Nightingale's rose diagram, doubly so since reading @infowetrust.com 's book. This diagram shows all ranked games within each category of @boardgamegeek.com, as well as top 500 & 100. Done in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 05/04/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 week 8 - Du Bois showing the ways in which Black Americans were concentrated in the South during the Reconstruction. Done in #rstats Code: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 04/04/2026

Catching up on #DuBoisChallenge2026 from @datavizsociety.bsky.social (Week 7). It is interesting how this is an introduction and plea for continued work at the university in both English and French. Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 04/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 4 - slope @boardgamegeek.com employs a Bayesian average, not a true average, in deciding ranks. This slope chart comparing average and bayesian average shows how games with more ratings don't change as much. Done with #rstats

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 03/04/2026

#30DayChartChallenge Day 3 - Mosaic Plot, done in #rstats For the top 1,000 board games ranked on @boardgamegeek.com, how prevalent are different categories by their publication date? You can see war games lessening over time, and family/strategy games increasing over time.

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 02/04/2026

Day 2 of #30DayChartChallenge - Pictograms Still using @boardgamegeek.com data, this shows the prevalence of different types of games in the top 100, ordered by rank - only one party game! All done in #rstats (working on cleaning up my repo to post code soon)

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 01/04/2026

For last year's #30DayChartChallenge, I had just finished reading @datavisfriendly.bsky.social's book and used his great historical data package. This year, I'll be focusing on APIs by exploring @boardgamegeek.com First day, done in #rstats. Part-to-whole - mechanics of the top 500 games

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 22/03/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 - took @datavisfriendly.bsky.social's advice and did two recreations of Du Bois' plate showing land ownership by Black Georgians. An original, and one showing the general increase in percentage of land ownership in certain areas Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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Nicola Rennie @nrennie.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

Happy #PiDay! Here's the first 1,000 digits of pi encoded as colours 🎨 made with #RStats

Digits of pi encoded as colours, arranged as a spiral with the symbol pi in the middle

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 15/03/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 - Week 5. Recreating Du Bois' map of the emigration and immigration of Black Georgians during years of Reconstruction requires using 'sf' in #rstats to make lines from the centroids of Georgia to each state, masked by the state's outline. Code: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 02/03/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 Week 4 - A comparison of black populations in Georgia in 1870 and 1880, showing some migration over 10 years during later Reconstruction. Code: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 24/02/2026

#DuBoisChallenge2026 Week 3 - just a nice little population map, done in #rstats Code: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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John Russell @drjohnrussell.com · 16/02/2026

#DuBoisChallenge Week 2! I'll admit, I love the projection that Du Bois uses more than mine, but when I changed it on my map, my legend got distorted (maybe a job for the 'patchwork' package). Hatching to recreate the original work done using ggpattern Code in #rstats: github.com/drjohnrussel...

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