The World Reduced to Infographics: From Hollywood's Life Lessons and Doomed Cities of the U.S. to Sociopathic Cats and What Your Drink Order Says About You

by Worm Miller, Patrick Casey

Discover the laugh-out-loud infographics that explain away the mysteries of the world with flow charts and graphic brilliance.

Respected academics agree that The World Reduced to Infographics is jam-packed with colorful illustrations. Now you can finally understand complex facts with the ease and enjoyment of eating an ice cream sandwich. After all, any information that can’t be explained with a hilarious infographic isn’t worth knowing.

• Are You Pregnant? Flow Chart
• Doomed Cities of U.S. Map
• Human Anatomy of Vices Diagram
• Reasons to Go Fishing Pie Chart
• Bowling Score by Drunkenness Area Graph

Genres: Nonfiction, Design, Humor, Comedy

128 pages, Paperback

First published October 11, 2011

Reviews

[Brian]

A funny take on infographics.

[Richard]

Funny. Irreverent. Very shareable. At about 6 by 6 inches, it's the perfect size for a gift.

The World Reduced to Infographics covers all kinds of important subjects with tongue firmly in cheek. The diagram of terrestrial strata moves down past morlocks and sand worms to indicate that the center of the earth is made of Tootsie Roll. A decision-tree flowchart helps you determine the proper course of action after inadvertently passing gas. And a comparison of captains shows how Cook lines up against Crunch, Morgan, and others.

My favorite bit was in a list of lessons learned from movies. The takeaway for Star Wars? Ancestry.com is worth the money.

There were parts that I passed along to my 11-year-old, but there were enough sexual references that I didn't want to send him off with the entire book. Some of the material edges toward NSFW, depending on where you work. So maybe not the next gift you give your boss, but a very entertaining read. Bound to liven up your sister's next birthday party.

[Randy]

Exploring how to visualize data, this book gave a glimpse of how information can be displayed in easy to access bits. Flow charts, graphs, tables...all can display information in a way that is fun and easy to understand. The topics of these infographics range from the ridiculous to the just plain odd.

I picked this book up as I have been working on infographics with my students, and this gave some tips on what kid of data to display.

I finished the book, well it was very short and easy to read.

I would recommend this to anyone who wants an irreverent look at some interesting but not always meaningful data.

[Adriana]

It's cute to look at, sometimes witty, and it contains a couple of useful/funny things.
However, I had to work hard at being interested in actually reading it instead of just flipping thru the pages. The introduction mentions this being a "bathroom" book, but I don't think I would even be interested in that scenario.

[Dale]

There's not much info, and the graphics are just OK, but this is a helluva funny little book. If you're looking for facts visualized you're in luck. If you want those facts to be true, you'll be a little disappointed.

[Deanna]

If there's such as thing as a sophomoric design book, this is it. Obviously written by young men for men (of any age, really, since men never really grow up). My husband and two teenage sons found it wildly entertaining. Me, not so much.

[GlenK]

Very clever and a quick read. Reminds me of GraphJam but with better graphics. The book could have been longer though.

[Carly]

I love infographics. This was not a good collection of infographics. It wasn’t insightful and informative or particularly funny. I could have done without this.