Ann Friedman’s “Disapproval Matrix”: A Great Way to Classify Your Critics

Ann Friedman’s Disapproval Matrix. Click to see the original.

Here’s Ann Friedman’s Disapproval Matrix, a quadrant chart that she created in her “ongoing quest for the perfect framework for understanding haters”. You may have seen her piece on haters earlier this year in New York magazine, which featured this other clever chart of hers:

The two axes that span the Disapproval Matrix are:

• Know you / Don’t know you, with people who know you intimately on the left end, and complete strangers on the right.
• Rational / Irrational, where the disapproval is completely rational at the top end, and completely irrational at the bottom.

These axes create four quadrants, which Friedman covers quite well in her article. Her recommendation is to listen to the negative feedback coming from the upper half, and pay no mind to the negative feedback coming from the lower half.

I love this graph. Be sure to read Friedman’s post!

Found thanks to AKMA, on his Facebook feed.