This tool (primarily with information about people and organizations) allows the researcher to quickly and visually identify relationships between people (how does one person relate to others) and organizations using Muckety’s technology (which they also license).
Researchers can:

+ Search for Names and Organizations. An advanced search interface is also available.

+ View Names and Organizations as they directly relate to the 40 latest stories in the news.

+ View Visualizations (and underlying news stores) by Category

In this case, reading the brief but informative help page is worthwhile as it includes a section on how the actual interactive visualizations work and the color codes used.

Finally, like all databases, Muckety is not perfect. This is especially the case as relationships are always changing or what they call in a constant change of “flux.” And of course not every person or group has Muckety visualization. So, as always, be careful. The company was founded in 2006 by journalists, technology types, and people with experience in online publishing.

If nothing else, Muckety is a great example of how useful information visualization can be.

Access Muckety.com

Source: Muckety.com
Hat Tips: P.W. & CyberJournalist.com

Update 1: You can also browse the entire Muckety index of visualizations by category here.

Update 2: Muckety contains map visualizations for many types of organizations and various groups of people that you might think would not be in this type of database. For example. countries (here’s one for Canada), sports teams, actors (Kevin Bacon has a very interactive map). and even fictional characters like Bart Simpson.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 12th, 2009 and is filed under Databases, Directories, and Guides, Information Industry, Reference Tools, Source File, Technology and Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.