Edward Tufte's Library Up For Auction 45
px2 writes "I was poking around Christie's auction house after taking a look at the Apple 1 when I came across this: Beautiful Evidence: The Library of Edward Tufte. He's unloading everything from Galileo and Da Vinci firsts to a rotating Japanese astronomical text from 1801. I guess he didn't conjure his ideas on information design from thin air." Based on Christie's estimates, the collection of 29 artifacts could fetch in excess of two and a quarter million dollars.
I wonder (Score:4, Insightful)
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The online auction catalog [christies.com] is beautiful.
Christie's is conducting another interesting auction a week later: The Year of the Rabbit: The Playboy Collection. This online auction catalog [christies.com] is NSFW.
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What, you mean this:
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It has a certain spartan minimalism, granted, but I was really expecting a bit more than that.
Does this mean.... (Score:2)
...I won't be receiving any more diagrams in the mail of Napoleon's march in and out of Russia?
Re:Does this mean.... (Score:5, Informative)
I took his one-day course in Seattle. The hall was absolutely packed, and I had to sit in the back. He goes through a lot of material that's from his books, and it's all wonderful. Hearing it from him in person is a lot better than reading; for example, the example of the cholera map from London didn't impress me in print as much as it did when he went over its history at the lecture. He also discusses why Powerpoint lends itself to abuse and how you can avoid information overload on slides. And he makes the point that he really, really loves high-density displays. When I took the course in 2008, he was raving about the high-resolution screen of the iPhone and how it's great from a high-density-information point of view.
The prize of the class is the collection of his four books in a nice cardboard box. They're all terrific reads and look great on one's bookshelf next to Knuth's masterpieces.
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When I took the course in 2008, he was raving about the high-resolution screen of the iPhone and how it's great from a high-density-information point of view
It might be high-resolution but it's still too small to convey much information.
Re:Does this mean.... (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, I've gone. Yes, you should too.
It won't turn you into Tufte, but even a ten-year course couldn't do that for most of us. What it will do is give you a language with which you can describe what's wrong with a poor presentation to a PHB, and in a language that even a PHB can understand. ("Sir, the reason nobody pays attention to our powerpoint presentations is because the technology's fundamentally broken. Nobody pays attention to anyone's powerpoint slides. Write up a couple of paragraphs, and present the data better, and put the pretty picture in the .ppt, and let the audience examine the picture for themselves. As they do so, they'll figure out what you're trying to say, and you can stop wasting time condensing everything into meaningless bullet points and simply indicate the region of the graph that's meaningful. They'll get it. They'll realize that you - because you're the only one presenting anything coherent - are the only guy up there not actively trying to bullshit them with PowerPoint. They'll buy our argument. They might even buy our stuff!")
This being Tufte, I shouldn't have been surprised, but I was really impressed that we got to actually use the books during the course, rather than just having him scan in a few pages into PowerPoint slides :)
Anyway, the four oversized books are packaged in a handy cardboard carrying case that's exactly the height of an O'Reilly book. The case therefore fits perfectly on a deep bookshelf. Like everything else Tufte does, it's all about usability.
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It won't turn you into Tufte, but even a ten-year course couldn't do that for most of us.
Jesus, get a room already.
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What nobody has mentioned so far is the intense physical pressure you experience at a Tufte presentation. It's like you're being pushed in on all sides, pressed incredibly strongly... by his ego.
There is no US auditorium large enough for you and Tufte's ego.
The ego is self-referential, and almost certainly will compare Tufte's books to Galileo's at some point, and also smarmy, self-confident and smug.
All that said, I loved going -- GO! You'll learn a lot. But then, I'm fascinated by huge egos, so whenever I
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Years ago (must have been 1997 or so), right before Visual Explanations was published, if I remember correctly (you went, got the first two books, and received Visual Explanations later).
It was terrific. And he had a few items from his library on hand to use as examples, which was pretty cool. One of the really great things about the course was his ability to put things in context and provide a vast array of examples of all different sorts.
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$2.5M? That's almost enough for (Score:3, Informative)
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a genetically modified shark with a laser on its head!
I'd go with irritable sea bass.
There's a lot less paperwork.
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a genetically modified shark with a laser on its head!
I'd go with irritable sea bass. There's a lot less paperwork.
Oh, the shark effect is worth the paperwork. :)
Warning: Pirated materials! (Score:5, Interesting)
I was flicking through stuff at random when I saw GALILEI, Galileo. Sidereus nuncius. Frankfurt: Poltheanus, 1610. [christies.com] which has the description:
"Pirated edition of Galileo's work containing "some of the most important discoveries in scientific literature" (PMM), published the same year as the first edition. This the the first publication of any of Galileo's works outside of Italy. ..."
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As rabid as the industries are now, don't be so sure about that.
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Of course it is! Italians never read pirated works willingly, they find it too hard to pronounce "Arr, Arr" :)
Re:I didn't read the auction (Score:5, Informative)
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Sorry to give that impression. It wasn't sarcasm. It doesn't really mean anything. These are not the droids you're looking for.
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It was an attempt at humor by stating something so completely obvious (that Tufte is steeped in the history of how to convey information visually) that my supposed surprise at discovering this would be funny. Since his books are chock full of this history, I didn't consider that I might be taken seriously on that point.
Wonderful books. I'd like to see him lecture.
2million in the hole (Score:1)
I saw one of his library books once (Score:2)
Back in the early 90s, I took a short course on visualization with Ed Tufte prior to a conference in Montreal. I remember him showing a book he had in his collection from a century I don't recall, that contained paper pop-ups to display three-dimensional geometric figures. It was awesome. I wonder if it's in the lot for auction...
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I believe that would be Euclid’s Elements. A copy of which seems to be listed (lot 11) with an estimate of $4-600, I'm guessing that is not an original.
Thanks. I think you're right that it's not an original. :-)
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I remember him showing a book he had in his collection from a century I don't recall, that contained paper pop-ups to display three-dimensional geometric figures. It was awesome
My five year old's got a pop up Dora the Explorer's Fairytale Adventure book, the dragon is especially awesome.
I am corrupted... (Score:3, Funny)
Finally someone has created a genuine and effective reason for me to desire to be a millionaire...
For ICP (Score:3, Funny)
>> RIDLEY, Mark (1560-1624). A Short Treatise of
>> Magneticall Bodies and Motions. London: Nicholas
>> Okes, 1613.
Translation :
Magneticall Bodies : How Theye doth Fornicating Function.
Never heard of him (Score:2)
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