2000 to 2009: The Rise of Social Networks and Economic Crises - The Technical and Social History of Software Engineering - page 286

The entire field of information gathering and dissemination has been transformed
by the internet, the World Wide Web, and the vast increase in converting books
and paper text documents for online storage.
HIVE Group
The HIVE Group is another small niche company that specializes in the visualiz-
ation of complex information using a patented method called tree mapping , deve-
loped by Ben Shneiderman of the University of Maryland.
The tree-mapping visualization method uses rectangles of various sizes and
colors to show hierarchies and relationships among data elements. This is hard to
explain in words, but a visit to the HIVE Group's website will reveal quite a few
interesting examples.
The HIVE Group was founded in Richardson, Texas, in 2000. The chairman
is H. William Jesse and the CEO is Jim Bartoo. Ben Shneiderman, the inventor
of tree mapping, is a corporate advisor. He is also a professor at the University of
Maryland.
Ben Shneiderman has a long history of invention in the areas of visualization of
information. He is credited with inventing the method of highlighting text phrases
that would allow users to jump from one website to another based on the specific
text. This is now the most widely used method of navigation during scientific re-
search. The word “hypertext” is used for these phrases with active web links.
Visualization of complex information is one of the more common uses of com-
puters. The tree-mapping method is now widely used by government agencies and
major corporations to improve the understanding of complex topics.
Although tree mapping is successful, the technology exists in the current era to
move beyond static diagrams and into the realm of animated, full-color, and even
three-dimensional representations of complex information.
The HIVE Group is an example of a company built around a single innovation,
but one that has enough interest to keep the company growing and profitable.
Intellectual Ventures
Intellectual Ventures is very controversial and has an interesting business model
that is based on patented intellectual property. Many of the patents are in the com-
puter and software domains, but there are also patents from other technical discip-
lines such as biology, medicine, physics, and all forms of engineering.