Comments on: Junk Charts: Secondary Axes

By: Deceptive Charts #2 | Stubborn Mule

Deceptive Charts #2 | Stubborn Mule — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:14:08 +0000

[...] month I wrote about the dangers of secondary axes, but even charts with a single axis can be deceiving. I have been reflecting on this after reading [...]

By: Sophia Bennett

Sophia Bennett — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:13:44 +0000

Hi Sean

I can’t believe I not only like but actually understand this post! Hooray for your powers of persuasion!

By: Marc

Marc — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 06:10:08 +0000

Great article – this is a particular bug bear of mine.

I think you might like this: http://www.mrscienceshow.com/2008/06/economists-oil-cricket-and-correlation.html

With secondary axes and a bit of deviousness, you can may anything look related to anything – in this case, aus cricket team performance and the price of oil – here was my followup to that, showing why it was dodgy in the first place: http://www.mrscienceshow.com/2009/02/poor-correlations-or-why-its-not-fault.html

By: Jon Peltier

Jon Peltier — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 01:55:21 +0000

“if it is easy to do in Excel, it is probably bad”

Secondary axes, pie charts, 3D charts, all that formatting. Yeah, that stuff is too easy to do, and bad.

By: Danny Yee

Danny Yee — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 06:12:40 +0000

I have a very low opinion of “technical analysis” (as an investment tool) at the best of times. But when done using charts like this – or charts of share prices that completely ignore massively dilutive capital raisings – it starts to make astrology seem empirical.

By: stubbornmule

stubbornmule — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 05:28:55 +0000

You’ve got a point there Stil. Perhaps I should be more specific: “it’s probably bad, but at least you shouldn’t catch anything”.

By: Stilgherrian

Stilgherrian — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 05:25:34 +0000

Your slogan “If it it’s easy to do in Excel, it is probably bad” also works if you replace “Excel” with “Las Vegas” or “Patpong Road, Bangkok”.