4 ms·

The article provides useful context about how much the hardiness grades have changed, where, and why; it provides context about what these ratings do and don’t

The article provides useful context about how much the hardiness grades have changed, where, and why; it provides context about what these ratings do and don’t mean; it adds context about other climate changes that aren’t captured in this data; and it frames it with advice about planting, underpinned by a visually interesting data plot, and a tool that allows you to explore that data in a way that makes it personally relevant to you. Why on earth would you choose an article like this to jump on a hobby horse about infotainment?

toss1 2y ago
I found it only marginally informative, the "interactive" map didn't work as well as I expected, and overall I found it disappointingly info-tainment-ish. I would not have said anything, but seeing the prior two comment, I responded to add something; sorry you found it disappointing, but my intent was not to "jump on a hobby horse about infotainment".
- jameshart 2y ago
  You probably didn’t scroll down very far then. Did you already know that these ‘hardiness’ climate zones are only based on mean winter minimum temperature? They say nothing about drought prevalence, peak heat, or the timing, frequency and duration of cold snaps? If you did, well, sure, this probably wouldn’t have been very informative. But for anyone for whom all that was news, this is pretty good information - and in particular is valuable context over and above just a raw map of the zones.
  - toss1 2y ago
    Yes, I did know that, and I did scroll down to the bottom. Even though it contained some good information, I just thought it was presented in a way that excessively got in the way of actually understanding and using the info, and that the graphic presentation was lame, just A:B with a very constrained and poorly working city-picker box (said enter city, wouldn't work or even give an error message unless you entered only one of the cities they actually had in their list, so should have been presented as a drop-down, not a free-entry box), didn't show the areas where there were differences vs stayed in the same zone, etc. etc. etc.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]

toss1 2y ago

I found it only marginally informative, the "interactive" map didn't work as well as I expected, and overall I found it disappointingly info-tainment-ish. I would not have said anything, but seeing the prior two comment, I responded to add something; sorry you found it disappointing, but my intent was not to "jump on a hobby horse about infotainment".

jameshart 2y ago
You probably didn’t scroll down very far then. Did you already know that these ‘hardiness’ climate zones are only based on mean winter minimum temperature? They say nothing about drought prevalence, peak heat, or the timing, frequency and duration of cold snaps? If you did, well, sure, this probably wouldn’t have been very informative. But for anyone for whom all that was news, this is pretty good information - and in particular is valuable context over and above just a raw map of the zones.
- toss1 2y ago
  Yes, I did know that, and I did scroll down to the bottom. Even though it contained some good information, I just thought it was presented in a way that excessively got in the way of actually understanding and using the info, and that the graphic presentation was lame, just A:B with a very constrained and poorly working city-picker box (said enter city, wouldn't work or even give an error message unless you entered only one of the cities they actually had in their list, so should have been presented as a drop-down, not a free-entry box), didn't show the areas where there were differences vs stayed in the same zone, etc. etc. etc.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]