The Nightingale team is thrilled to introduce our new managing editor, Emily Barone! We’re excited for the new energy, ideas, and experience she is already bringing to our team. But enough from us… In true Nightingale fashion, we’ve asked her to introduce herself via Three Questions With.
Emily Barone is a career journalist who, over the course of about two decades, managed to go from hating math class to running newsroom data literacy trainings. She’s worked at several national publications—including most recently at TIME magazine, where she wrote and visualized data-informed stories about health and climate. She is slightly obsessed with the challenge of translating large graphics into mobile-friendly versions. Her favorite tools of the trade are Python, Datawrapper, and colored pencils. During off hours, you can find Emily attending French classes, strolling around public parks, and rock climbing.
1. If you could be any type of chart, what would you be?
A scatter plot, because they show relationships. Relationships, both in data and in life, are so important! Also, in just the last few months, I bought a house, moved to Connecticut from New York City, grew my household from four people to five, adopted two cats, and landed a new job at the wonderful Data Visualization Society. So much change at once has certainly left me scatterbrained at times.
2. What’s one topic you would love to visualize but have never had the chance to?
An autobiographical timeline of my adult years, told through my Amazon cart. My order history goes back to the early 2000s, when I bought The Healthy College Cookbook: Quick, Cheap, Easy ($13). That already tells a lot about what was going on in my life! Then there are, of course, the milestone purchases for the first apartment, the wedding, and the waves of pregnancy and baby gear—more like a tsunami for the first kid. But the odds and ends that I bought along the way also tell a story about my hobbies and intellectual interests, my travel and vacations, and even my career. Some even flick at world events, like my pandemic-era home office chair splurge ($300). It’ll take a long time to categorize all the orders in a way that would make sense for a visualization, but I do hope to start the project soon, as it will be a work in progress until, well, you know.
3. If you had to choose an entirely new career path, realistic or not, what would it be?
I might choose a path that would let me work with plants. I love gardens, parks, and arboretums—they are truly my happy places! But it’s hard to say whether this path would be realistic. Despite my deep affection for greenery in nature, I have yet to own a house plant that I haven’t murdered.
Nightingale Editors
Our Nightingale editorial team currently consists of Alejandra Arevalo, William Careri, Jason Forrest, Elijah Meeks, and Teo Popescu. Reach us at Nightingale(at)Datavisualizationsociety.org
