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fathominfo

We build platforms and products for understanding data. See the full archive of our writing on process, client work, and curiosities at fathom.info/notebook.

Kicking off 2022

Kicking off 2022

This was originally intended to be a spring 2021 e-mail, which became a summer update, then it was gonna be “goodbye to our intern” in…
Go to the profile of Ben Fry
Ben Fry
Jan 25, 2022
Building Tools for the Next—and the Current—Pandemic

Building Tools for the Next—and the Current—Pandemic

For years, Pardis Sabeti has tried to get funding to build the necessary tools to mitigate the “next pandemic.” On the front lines of the…
Go to the profile of Ben Fry
Ben Fry
Oct 1, 2021
Twenty Twenty…

Twenty Twenty…

To navigate the strange territory of 2020, which included learning to collaborate with team members 5,000 miles away, keeping 10,000…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Dec 17, 2020
The Latest from Fathom –February 2020

The Latest from Fathom –February 2020

If you’ve had an opportunity to check out fathom.info recently, you may have noticed that we recently redesigned our website.
Go to the profile of Olivia Glennon
Olivia Glennon
Mar 10, 2020
Building a maze typeface

Building a maze typeface

Mazeletter is a collection of nine infinitely tiling pattern fonts.
Go to the profile of Paul Cronan
Paul Cronan
Mar 4, 2020
Context-Driven Activity Apps

Context-Driven Activity Apps

Before we went on break for the holidays in December, the office got together to brainstorm solutions to a question we’ve been thinking…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Jan 6, 2020
The Year in Review

The Year in Review

At the end of the year, we like to take some time to recap what we accomplished over the past 12 months. From client work to internal…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Dec 20, 2019
Knitting Our Holiday Cards

Knitting Our Holiday Cards

Earlier this year Fathom acquired a Brother KH910 knitting machine. We’d been trying to learn more about it with the hope that we would…
Go to the profile of Sarah Friedman
Sarah Friedman
Dec 16, 2019
Tackling Adult Literacy with the Barbara Bush Foundation

Tackling Adult Literacy with the Barbara Bush Foundation

This summer, we teamed up with the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy (BBFFL) to investigate the current status of adult literacy…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Dec 10, 2019
The Latest from Fathom –Fall 2019

The Latest from Fathom –Fall 2019

This fall, we’ve had the opportunity to wrap up some long-running projects that we’re excited to finally share with the public. We’ve…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Dec 4, 2019
Understanding a Changing City

Understanding a Changing City

Using data to understand how income inequality in Boston has changed over time.
Go to the profile of Anisha Nakagawa
Anisha Nakagawa
Nov 18, 2019
Introducing Laniakea

Introducing Laniakea

When faced with more documents than you can possibly read, what do you do? For more than twenty years, search engines like Google, Bing…
Go to the profile of Mark Schifferli
Mark Schifferli
Nov 14, 2019
Monthly Update — Summer 2019

Monthly Update — Summer 2019

We had a remarkably busy summer this year. With client projects to develop, workshops to teach, and a host of interns and new hires to…
Go to the profile of Fathom Information Design
Fathom Information Design
Nov 7, 2019
Using Processing’s map() function

Using Processing’s map() function

This past summer, the team at Fathom hosted a class week in which we took an abbreviated look at Fathom’s information design methodology…
Go to the profile of Erin Thomas
Erin Thomas
Oct 22, 2019
Rethinking Patient Data at the Mayo Transform Conference

Rethinking Patient Data at the Mayo Transform Conference

Recently, several members of the Fathom team had the opportunity to attend Mayo Clinic’s Transform Conference in Rochester, MN. The…
Go to the profile of Martha Durrett
Martha Durrett
Oct 10, 2019
Healthcare Data + Design, the Next 20 Years

Healthcare Data + Design, the Next 20 Years

There are so many interesting data & design problems in healthcare—here are a few that we’re thinking about.
Go to the profile of Ben Fry
Ben Fry
Oct 1, 2019
Useful Document Summary Stats

Useful Document Summary Stats

It only takes a couple of sentences to get a feel for the character of a document. Take these examples:
Go to the profile of Linda Gorman
Linda Gorman
Jul 31, 2019
“Coding is Magical”: A Week at Fathom University

“Coding is Magical”: A Week at Fathom University

Two weeks ago, the team adapted coursework from our MIT course into a week-long class for Fathom’s interns, new employees, and some family…
Go to the profile of Eve Wallack
Eve Wallack
Jun 24, 2019
Building a Diverse Team

Building a Diverse Team

Reflecting on diversity in design and tech, and how Fathom is working to make our hiring process more inclusive.
Go to the profile of Anisha Nakagawa
Anisha Nakagawa
Jun 4, 2019
The Joy of Parsing

The Joy of Parsing

We analyzed the transcripts from all 403 episodes of Bob Ross’ The Joy of Painting using our custom tools to understand large document sets
Go to the profile of Fernando Becerra
Fernando Becerra
May 29, 2019
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