Diffusion Patterns

While on my second prototype I was trying to deal with a structured way to map connectivity among blogs, by isolating the hubs and sort the nodes according to popularity, recently, I’ve been exploring possible ways of visualizing diffusion patterns over time. I tried several models based on a radial structure where time becomes the major constraint. In most of these experiences I faced a common problem in representing a continuous flow of infected blogs. The underlying radial structure seemed to impose its rigidness by enforcing fractures in the pattern, particularly whenever there was a day transition.

At the moment I’m becoming convinced that a horizontal array is truly the best way of representing the quantitative and temporal qualities of a pattern. Time is a crucial domain in a dissemination pattern, particularly in a word-of-mouth social behavior. The amazing potentialities of a horizontal assortment is the uninterrupted continuous flow of data and the possibility of collapsing time frames and still maintain a sense of scale and understanding of the pattern dynamics.

Since I produced these visual studies, about two weeks ago, I’ve been sketching, writing, and annotating like a mad man. I’ve built a few diagrams to get a full understanding of my system; built several taxonomies and dissected the mechanics of blogging. I’ll soon update this blog with my thoughts on this issue. One thing is sure, this examination process is helping me so much putting my ideas straight and getting a sense of what I’m dealing with, and also, I’m sure it’s going to be crucial when I start building the visualization system.

Here are some of the visual models I’ve done in the last two weeks: