Brett Ian Balogh creates beautiful abstractions that document the mass media’s airwave occupation.

Mint, the newly acquired financial startup, crunches user data to reveal which American cities cut spending the most in 2009.

Local First, a Grand Rapids. Michigan based organization that encourages sustainable, locally-based economies has made a simple but effective illustration of how money flows if it’s spent at a locally owned business versus a non-local business.
They explain their top ten reasons to shop local first:
1. Significantly More Money Re-circulates In Greater Grand Rapids.
When you purchase at locally owned businesses rather than nationally owned, more money is kept in the community because locally-owned businesses often purchase from other local businesses, service providers and farms. Purchasing local helps grow other businesses as well as the Greater Grand Rapids tax base.
2. Non Profits [...]

Ed Cotton points us to a beautiful package design for a Red Bull Cola promotional piece. Using a sturdy wood box, and real samples of the 17 natural ingredients of the cola, Design Friendship created a striking presentation of the unseen raw material that goes into the drink. And in our increasingly virtualized-digitized world. the display is a great testament to the commanding presence of physical objects.

[Lovely Package via Influx Insights]

Radical Cartography has made a compelling infographic displaying the different paths of the urban mass transit systems of North America.
[via Wehr in the World]

Olly Moss is a talented illustrator and designer, whose work has been making the rounds lately. We especially like his stylized humorous infographic designs. See more here.
[via Cross Faded Bacon]

The New York Times has a great interactive infographic that visually displays the number of medals that countries won in summer Olympic Games. From the 1896 games in Athens to the current tally of Beijing medal winners, the “map” is an intriguing look at the changing tides of the games and political powers. Who remembers Britain’s impressive haul of 56 gold medals in 1906 or China’s very first one in Los Angeles in 1984?
New York Times: A Map of Olympic Medals