OkCupid's data team wrote the OkTrends posts, analyzing its dating data on looks, race, messaging, and profile photos.
Commenters call it a fantastic, fascinating source of insights from a unique dataset, and cite it on how people judge looks and interests.
SEEKING FREELANCER looking for a "data reporter", Burlingame, CA and/or remote
About Us
We think that OkTrends (http://blog.okcupid.com/) is one of the best blogs for compiling research on real-life usage patterns in an interesting, visual, way, and we want to re-create it for car-buying.
We also think that people should be able to buy a car using the internet for as much of the transaction as possible. Our mission at CarWoo!(YC S09) is to become "THE Transactional Car Buying and Selling Marketplace." We are getting closer to our goal all the time, and have now seen many thousands of transactions come through the site. We're sitting on piles and piles of data, and we need to get it out in a more broad way.
To fulfill our mission, we have to get the word out about who we are. That's where you come in.
About You
You should be curious about patterns in data, have a background in research or other relevant experience, and have a knack for writing in a way that is relatable to ordinary folks, yet packed with insight and deep understanding.
More Details
We've got lots of ideas on posts, you'll be free to add your ideas to the pot also. As far as the actual content of the posts, think lots of charts, statistical analysis of our data, and a story around everything from who our visitors are, to what times of the year people do their car-buying, to trending & popular cars, etc.
If you're interested, email me at adamc@carwoo.com
This would be an ongoing project, with a steady…
A great visualization! And it is great that the authors provide links to the movie scripts (I think I will use these for another movie visualizations).
The only qualm is the scrolling - I would really prefer to have these visualizations being separate and scrolling behave normally. Sure, I understand it looks cool and fashionable, but (at least for me) its really distracting.
When it comes to the good stuff - I like the most the last feature, when one is a able to search for movies and look at characters (sometimes movie is "male" or "female" due to protagonist... or the mentor character, which very often have more lines).
For actor ages - a nice pick (I think it is highly related to the viewers' preferences - vide http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-case-for-an-older-woman/).
Infographics and statistics seem to be a new advertising strategy. I say this appreciatively mind you! I far prefer these sorts of posts than the generic PR babble produced by most companies. OkCupid[1] seemed to be one of the pioneers of the format and I'm glad to see others follow.
What exactly is the attraction however? Do we feel we get a more thorough understanding of ourselves or our friends when looking at this? When you look down at the figure that says "You have 97,000 photos in your network" does that give you a new found respect to the collaborative creative ability of your social circle? Of humanity overall?
I'm interested as whatever it is that attracts us to this page is as much a reflection on us as it is on the article.
[1] http://blog.okcupid.com/
Who would you prefer doing daily standups or long stretches of remote pair programming with?
The one with the low resolution, low contrast, washed out, low fps video that makes it hard to read emotion or even detect where his/her attention is?
Or the one with sharp features, pleasant colour rendition, high resolution, and maybe even a pretty bokeh in the background?
Humans love pretty pictures. See OKCupids[1] image analysis vs attractiveness for example. Shallow DOF = More attractive.
See also hanselman's[2] thoughts on the matter of having a high quality setup for remote work.
[1]: https://theblog.okcupid.com/dont-be-ugly-by-accident-b378f261dea4
[2]: https://www.hanselman.com/blog/GoodBetterBestCreatingTheUltimateRemoteWorkerWebcamSetupOnABudget.aspx
"It's not a gender thing, it's an effort thing."
Then why are there vast asymmetries along gender lines in virtually all aspects of dating? Look at OkTrends (http://blog.okcupid.com), or Dan Ariely's posts on the subject (http://danariely.com/tag/dating/), or this post from a woman http://www.alternet.org/why-online-dating-sucks-men) which indicates high dating success for women putting in low effort. Are men and women just putting in different amounts of effort? The question is then, why is that the case? And that case arises from historical gender roles. It is a gender thing.
Your "many people ..." statements are platitudes that are true no matter what follows ("Many people are smart; many people are dumb."), and do nothing to support what you "suspect."
After a little research according to http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/colours-in-cultures/
Also most people's favorite color is blue http://www.joehallock.com/edu/COM498/preferences.html
In Western Culture blue is associated with: cold | freedom | happiness | intelligence | loyalty | rational | unhappiness
In Japan blue is associated with: cold | life | loyalty | money | peace | rational
I wonder, does that have any implications on what color to choose when I design my website?
Completely unrelated: Women are attracted to men in red http://www.brainmysteries.com/research/Women_attracted_to_men_in_red_research_shows.asp
Examining that would make a great post for the guys at http://blog.okcupid.com