5 ways to improve the U.S. currency.

Those who challenge the status quo often fail, but there is at least some success in the attempt itself. The world of branding is littered with failures, but sadly, they have challenged nothing more than the limits of mediocrity. Fail bigger? Sure. Even better: fail bolder.

Branding, for the most part, is a discipline of how people feel about a thing, and therefore deals in the abstract. Graphic Design, on the other hand, is a discipline of how people read, understand, and respond to a thing, and is rooted in more practical concerns such as legibility, clarity, and visual harmony. Too often, the practicality of Design takes a back seat to the intangible subjectivities of Branding--and communication can suffer as a result. But there is a way to put pragmatism to work in service of the abstract. Legendary designer Paul Rand was the undisputed master of that. See for yourself.

More than ever, companies are turning to graphic representation to get their ideas across and communicate the content of their data. Good information design sends a message more concisely—and often more effectively—than a huge set of numbers or a page of text. Thanks to their easy absorption, infographics are becoming ubiquitous, producing a new visual vernacular. Understanding this language, though, is much simpler than creating it.