Infographic Overload

I love a good infographic as much as the next guy.  I really do.  An infographic done right can make a point much more effectively than straight text.  See this example.  Or this one or this one.

But the last few months things have gotten out of hand.  In an effort to create viral, easily-digestible content, many publishers seem to have abandoned writing altogether and gone to an all-infographic, all-the-time format. 

Sometimes the resulting infographics are simply window dressing that don’t add anything to the data presented (via @dostrower).  In other cases they are so complicated that they actually get in the way of understanding the information that is being conveyed.  And sometimes they are so badly done they are misleading or incomprehensible.

I think we all need to take a step back, and think through if value is being added before we decorate our content with stick figure men, maps, and concentric circle graphs.  Not everything needs to be an infographic.

Check out the great Think Brilliant parody of infographics below.