Created as a resource, the BMW Guggenheim Lab 100 Urban Trends offers a glossary of contextualized definitions that apply to the way we understand, design, and live in cities. Integral to this glossary is the concept of cities as “idea makers.” In cities, people come together, share their thoughts and common interests, and generate the ideas that shape our world. Dense, growing cities have been and continue to be the catalyst for human progress, powered by daily proximity among their citizens as much as anything else. Despite some of the drawbacks of such massive urban centers, they may well embody the future for human life. Today’s cities are competing to attract more people; greater urban density can mean more conflict, but it can also produce a greater diversity of viewpoints and more opportunity for positive change. 

From Arduino to Urban Psychology and beyond, download this fantastic read here.

Climate Chain – visualizing natural ecosystems and the goods and services humans have extracted from them in the last 50 years.

“The investigation into the relationship between the size of a country and its prosperity shows that extreme dimensions are an advantage.”  (via)

This Chart Is a Lonely Hunter: The Narrative Eros of the Infographic – an excellent, thorough meditation on the history, future, and cultural footprint of infographics.

bestfriends – Colin Pinegar asked his Facebook friends a series of questions, then plotted the scored answers on the color spectrum and made wax busts for each person.   (via)

Cartographies of Time – a visual history of the timeline.

How long different animals live, in a vintage infographic by pictogram pioneer Otto Neurath circa the 1930s. Neurath created ISOTYPE, the visual language that gave rise to modern infographics.

Visualizing the dizzying array of headache pills at the average pharmacy is sure to give you a headache.

Visualizing bird migration throughout the year.   (via)