I’m sorry to tell you serious types out there, but visual analysis is often a game — in fact, one of the best games in town with Tableau Software’s visual analysis tool. Now Tableau Public is going to bring it to the masses.

In the same way that YouTube spawned a surge of new filmmakers, Tableau Public — free, running the same engine as its desktop sibling, and embedable — will bring on a new generation of data players and spectators.

I was a spectator at a data visualization conference one afternoon two years ago. Tableau Software director of visual analysis Jock Mackinlay had finished his presentation and another person had started his. Yet someone at the control board forgot to flip a switch, and Jock’s live screen remained on one of the room’s big screens. Jock assumed his screen had been hidden, and he kept playing with the data. I don’t have to tell you who seemed to have the audience’s attention until someone pointed out the problem.

The mere visual distraction was minor. Even without narration, I got caught up in the apparent drama as he tried one look at the data after another.

Not long after that, I wondered aloud to someone at Tableau about data hobbyists. I imagined people who foraged for data to analyze then publicize it to start conversations, collaboration, or duels. Data would be their raw material of choice just as scrap metal is to some sculptors or overheard conversations is to some fiction writers.

There was no such community visible then. But I realized this week that I know one now: Dan Murray, a skilled, dedicated Tableau user. He jokes that he’s a “freak” because he analyzes data from the federal budget and posts his often provocative analyses. He’s already been answered by at least one who disagrees with him.

In beta and since its February 11 launch, Tableau Public has hosted a flurry of visualizations, including these: a map of top venture capital firms investments by U.S. region; a chart showing how long it takes to build a technology empire; a history of earthquakes in Haiti; a neighborhood breakdown of housing supply in Seattle; trends in U.S. high school graduation; and studies of deprivation and marginalization in education. In most cases, spectators can become players by selecting subsets of the data to find answers to their own questions.

With popularity comes some misuse. Many of the charts will break rules, such as what happens in another kind of game, YouTube. A New York film editor I know complains that many YouTube-acculturated film editors have neglected basic editing principles. She writes that they rely so much on special effects that they “can’t put two shots together and have them work as an unembellished edit.” On Tableau Public, there will be pie charts, chart junk, and even baselines that do not start at zero. We’ll survive it.

But what’s all this got to do with the very serious practice of business intelligence?

Like monks must have done when printing presses began producing books for the masses, many priests of business intelligence will stand aside, arms folded in the aspe chapel. But I predict that before long even they will appreciate a wider, deeper pool of analytical talent ripening for training and employment.

I suspect that the new bunch will have been sharpened by the give and take of public exposition. They’ll also learn from playing in a huge community the way artists and craftspeople of all kinds improve their skills when they bump into peers every day.

This is a new clue for the future of BI. It can’t help but improve data analysis in business. So let the games begin.

There’s a new way to learn BI skills — at the desktop. eLearningCurve launched May 15. Former TDWI education director Dave Wells directs the program.

He’s excited. “We’re trying to fill a space that no one else has filled,” he says. No one else has done a good job of training over the Internet, which requires a different set of skills than training in conferences.

“Just in time training” has a solid place in this economy, he says. With smaller teams trying to do more with less, fewer companies can afford to send people away or wait for the right course at the right event. “You need to get really relevant education when you need it. ”

The out-of-pocket funded company launched with five courses in data quality. “Sale” prices for each course range from $266 to $356.

By the end of the year, Dave hopes to have 60 courses in four curricula, including data modeling, data governance and master data management. Then they’ll move into business intelligence and data warehousing, agile development, enterprise architecture, and IT governance.

He emphasizes that he does not want to compete with TDWI or anyone else. In fact, he hopes that eventually eLearningCurve can offer courses in partnership with others.

It all started, says Dave, when he was approached by Arkady Maydanchik, now managing director. They’ve spent nine months developing the business. Also on the team: operations director John Toepfer, director of engineering Noah Mentakoff, and director of marketing Erik Kavanagh.

“The stars were aligned,” Dave says. “I’m never going to be very good at retirement.”

A new source in the education-testing business tells me about a “huge cultural collision” between the “sensate, feeling types and the new racetrack bettor types.”

Steve Rees comes from the publishing business, where for years he ran circulation for major computer mags. He’s been into data a long time.

In the last few years, he’s been developing and running School Wise Press. Its mission, as the website puts it, is “helping districts and state departments of education report their schools’ results.” School Wise does it with an online interface developed by my old friend and longtime database mogul Sam Hammond.

The “collision” that Steve describes sounds awfully much like the friction we see in business. As the sensate types put it, “I go by gut.”

I have a bunch of reading to do for this new TDWI story. Then the email and phone calls to sources in Tennessee, California, Belgium and Sicily.