As mentioned earlier, nonprofits can have difficulty with design. Well John’s answer over at Social Design Notes was to developed a booklet that introduces advocacy groups and NGOs to basic principles & techniques of information design. A work with Tacitcal Tech collective and OSI Information Program, the booklet is full of examples of interesting design from groups around the world in a variety of media and forms for social awareness. It even has tips, exercises, and even recommended Free Software packages to help polish up your graphics.

According to the blog information aesthetics, which posted on the booklet, “‘information aesthetic‘, ‘casual‘, ‘expressive‘, or ‘primitive‘ visualizations are playing a big part in the communication of data-rich information in more subjective ways, such as the highlighting of concepts ‘about’ the data, instead of focusing on patterns ‘within’ the data.”

It’s being able to tell this story about the data that non-profits can really benefit from. Well designed visualization of data can be extremely powerful, effective, compelling and just plain cool; a powerful tool if used in favor of visually representing social stories that nonprofits have such difficulty getting across in often wordy media like brochures. Some great examples included in the booklet are Exxon Secrets & Iraq Casualties & Gapminder & Worldmapper. You can download it here.

via information aesthetics