It’s no secret that I don’t like guns. But neither am I someone who thinks gun owners are all wingnuts who are stockpiling guns to protect themselves against the government (which is why I frequently lampoon those who are doing this) or to murder their neighbors. If you want to think seriously about ways to put a brake on gun deaths in our country — apart from arming everyone, which is the NRA position — simply publishing a list of (some) (potential) gun owners isn’t going to help.Ari Kohen • Offering an effective bit of commentary regarding the gun registry map put online by a New York-based newspaper. What benefit does posting public information about people who have guns offer? Not a lot, honestly. It doesn’t add much to the gun control debate, it shames and endangers people who don’t necessarily deserve either shaming or endangerment, and it gets away from the actual issue at hand. Yes, it’s public data. No, it doesn’t really shine a light on anything, other than that this is a really effective way of pissing people off.
Apple Inc. (AAPL) has fired the manager responsible for its troubled mapping software, seeking to win back the trust of users disappointed after the program debuted in September, according to people familiar with the move.
Richard Williamson, who oversaw the mapping team, was pushed out by Senior Vice President Eddy Cue, said the people, who asked not to be named because the information wasn’t yet public. Cue, who took over last month as part of a management shakeup, is seeking advice from outside mapping-technology experts and prodding digital maps providerTomTom NV (TOM2) to fix landmark and navigation data it shares with Apple.
Given the public reaction to Apple’s in-house Maps app, we can’t say we’re entirely surprised by this announcement, though we sort of expected Williamson to be shown the door weeks ago if it was going to happen. The decision was apparently made by new Senior Vice President Eddy Cue following last month’s Apple executive shuffle. Of course, many people probably think the entire situation is being blown out of proportion. What say you, dear reader?E
The Subway Is Back (Sorta)
As of tomorrow, mass rail transit is kinda returning to New York City!
The upshot, basically, is:
- You can get from the Bronx to Upper Manhattan, and Upper Manhattan to the Bronx.
- You can get from Queens to Upper Manhattan, and Upper Manhattan to Queens.
- You can kinda get around Queens and the Bronx
- You can get east to west in north and central Brooklyn, and
- from central Brooklyn to parts of South Brooklyn, and vice versa.
- If you want to go between Brooklyn and Manhattan you can take one of three shuttle busses, running from, respectively, Atlantic Center, Jay Street and Hewes St. and all going to 57th and Lexington Ave.
Here is a map:
The slow crawl back to normalcy continues. Good luck, New Yorkers.
The Los Angeles Times has compiled a searchable database of the “perversion files”, a collection of more than 1900 documents outlining allegations of sexual abuse on the part of Boy Scouts of America employees and volunteers. The files cover a period of time spanning two decades, and case summaries from more than 3,100 cases opened between 1947 and 2005. The map above depicts each of the troops or units mentioned in one or more documents found in the LA Times’ collection. (Photo via LA Times) source
![theatlantic:
Mapping Acceptance of Same-Sex Marriage
According to the rule books, same-sex marriage is mostly unacceptable in the U.S. But that’s not the case when looking at the opinions of the American people. According to anew set of maps from Esri, same-sex marriage is popular in large swaths of the country.
The maps break support for same-sex marriage down by county. Green and yellow dots represent counties where people support same-sex marriage, while orange and red dots represent places where people do not. As you can see, there’s no consensus across the country.
Read more. [Image: Esri]
We tend to think this often, but it’s pertinent as ever — recalling the tenor of the 2004 presidential election on marriage rights, the distance public opinion has moved in just eight years is staggering.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mapgrnmdn41qcokc4o1_500.jpg)
Mapping Acceptance of Same-Sex Marriage
According to the rule books, same-sex marriage is mostly unacceptable in the U.S. But that’s not the case when looking at the opinions of the American people. According to anew set of maps from Esri, same-sex marriage is popular in large swaths of the country.
The maps break support for same-sex marriage down by county. Green and yellow dots represent counties where people support same-sex marriage, while orange and red dots represent places where people do not. As you can see, there’s no consensus across the country.
Read more. [Image: Esri]
We tend to think this often, but it’s pertinent as ever — recalling the tenor of the 2004 presidential election on marriage rights, the distance public opinion has moved in just eight years is staggering.
What do Craigslist and Apple have in common? Besides coming down heavy with the lawsuits of late, both are now using OpenStreetMap — after spurning competition (in Apple’s case, Google; in Craigslist’s case, PadMapper) that used alternate mapping systems. Interesting.
Image description: This map shows tornado tracks from 1950 to 2006. Stronger tornadoes appear as brighter lines.
The map was created by John Nelson of IDV Solutions using data that’s available on Data.gov. Learn more about the map.
In which destructive, deadly acts of mother nature are presented in a way that makes you wanna go, “whoa, awesome!”
Apple’s new IOS mapping app: Siri integration, 3D mapping, and um, is that Gill Sans? Eric Gill would be proud. (more)
How the WMATA Rush+ Maps Are Printed
Many thanks to Matt Johnson for telling me about this amazing photoset on Flickr that details the process involved in printing the new Rush+ station maps for Washington, DC’s Metro system. Click through to see the whole set!
Even as an experienced graphic designer, I was amazed to see that the maps are screen printed - each colour on the map is printed one after the other, each using a separate screen with its own spot colour ink. With a map as complex as this, that means that there are a whopping twelve different colours to print! These being: river blue, park green, National Mall green, Blue Line, Orange Line, Yellow Line, Green Line, Red Line, Silver Line, District/County border grey, Beltway grey, and finally, black.
I would have thought with the advances in digital printing and stochastic (micro) screening, that these could be produced digitally in one step instead of twelve, but maybe these are special long-lasting UV inks that will withstand many years of use without fading - an important consideration for station maps! In any case, these photos are a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at a process that many people may not even think about.
EDIT: A tweet from a Metro representative confirms that there are THIRTEEN colours used in the printing: 4 greys (Silver Line, Beltway grey, county border grey, and icon grey), 3 greens (parks, Mall, Green Line), 2 Blues (river, Blue Line), Black, Red, Yellow and Orange.
OH MY GOD! I <3 <3 <3 this more than that time I met Bieber.
Dear fans of DC Metro maps: Here’s how they make them. Wow. Awesome.
Made in New York City
A map of NYC start-ups, incubators and investors. Also includes information about companies that are hiring if you’re in the market.
Why just NYC? We’d like to see a similar map of startups around the country. Who knows, we might just surface a latent hotbed in the Rust Belt.
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FCC announces creation of mobility fund: In a press release Friday morning, the FCC reaffirmed its commitment to increasing broadband and mobile coverage in rural areas. The agency announced the creation of a new Mobility Fund, a new addition to the Connect America Fund, created to “accelerate our nation’s ongoing efforts to close gaps in mobile wireless service.” Included in the press release was a reminder that the agency will soon host a $300 million reverse auction, with the winner receiving $300 million to provide rural broadband coverage. They also revealed an interactive map of the nation’s worst coverage areas, created with online map-making tool MapBox. source
What makes this U.S. map better than any other U.S. map? Attention to detail. The guy who designed it — a seasoned cartographer named David Imus — spent 6,000 hours of his own time building it. And according to other cartographers, it shows — from the shading to the typography on down. Neat.
Middle East on the brink of war: analysis
As Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad clings to power with the quiet backing of regional powers Iran and Russia, the Middle East may be sliding slowly into war.
Squeezed between the rebellions of a bloody Arab Spring and growing fears of a possible military response to Iran’s growing nuclear threat, the region is becoming increasingly unstable.
“I would be very surprised if it turned into a Russian-American war, but this could be a Mid-East war: Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran, Syria, Israel all having at each other,” said Jack Granatstein, military historian and senior research fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute.
Let’s hope that the region doesn’t get any more volatile than it already is. Do you think this analysis is spot-on?
Unemployment rate by county. Click here to interact. Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Graphic by Kat Downs, Mary Kate Cannistra and Nathaniel Vaughn Kelso.
A nice county-by-county unemployment map - not for the faint of heart, obviously.
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