While graph visualizations usually have a very positive effect on its users, we—as IT people that are provided this as an interface to interact with data—must also be aware of the fact that these visualizations can be a bit too much sometimes. We call that the "fireworks" effect, and while by no means specific to graph visualizations, it is an important thing to be aware of. The purpose of visualization can never be to attract oooohs and aaaahs—that's what fireworks are supposed to do for the crowds of spectators that they attract. Contrarily, the purpose of visualization should always be to communicate with the beholders and to transfer information from the software application that we are building on top of a Graph Database Management System such as Neo4j to its users. This seems like a trivial point, but we know from experience that it is often forgotten.

With that purpose of visualizations in mind, we should also take into account another aspect that is crucially important in the world of data visualizations: the loading effect. This effect is, again, not specific to graph visualizations and is omnipresent in many charts and graphics presented by newspapers and television reports alike. We mean to highlight the effect that a particular type of presentation of the data has in the interpretation process of the user.

By making certain choices on how we present the data, the options that we present to the user, even the colors that we choose for certain data elements, we may load the visualization with certain expectations and interpretations on behalf of the end user. Data visualizations should therefore always highlight and explain the choices made to the end user and offer different ways of representing the data if that would be of use.