Over the last couple of years there has been a number of clever promotional campaigns by companies using the Google Maps API (often taking advantage of Google Maps Street View imagery). Two of my favorite maps featured on Google Maps Mania this week were from Toyota and Moët & Chandon.

Both companies have managed to create campaigns with Google Maps that reflect some of the core values associated with their products and at the same time create interactions with potential customers.


Toyota has come up with one of the best Google Maps based promotional campaigns yet. To help promote the car the company are driving a Toyota IQ around with a 360 degree panoramic camera rig strapped to the roof. They are then capturing Street View images and filling in all the blanks on Google Maps.

The campaign, currently running in Belgium, allows anyone to report a street that doesn’t have Street View on the Toyota IQ - Street View Google Map. The Toyota IQ then travels to the street, captures the Street View images and adds them to their Toyota IQ map.


If you can’t afford to whisk the love of your life off for a romantic weekend in Paris you could try sending her a romantically tagged Street View image from the city instead. You never know it just might work.

Tag Your Love in the Streets is a nice Street View based promotional campaign by Moët & Chandon. Using the application you can select a Street View image from anywhere in the world and then add your own message. You can add text to the image and decorate the scene with a number of romantically themes images, such as flowers, hearts or a bottle of champagne.


The island of Sumatra in Indonesia has lost almost 50% of its tropical rainforest in the last 35 years. The World Wildlife Fund, Eyes on the Forest and Google Earth Outreach have joined forces to create a Google Map of land cover, land use, and land users in Sumatra.

Eyes on the Forest: Sumatra allows users to explore data about the island’s conservation values, forest diversity and wildlife. The aim of the map is to increase transparency about the threats to the Sumatran environment and identify the drivers of deforestation and habitat destruction.

It is possible to view a number of data layers on the map, including the dwindling rainforest cover over the last 35 years, wildlife ranges, protected areas and natural carbon stores. 

from Google Maps Mania (By: Keir Clarke) http://bit.ly/Kfi2Ym

My hat comes off for methodist pastor Lorenza Andrade-Smith, who a year ago convinced her bishop to allow her a three-year stint of ministering to the homeless of San Antonio, Texas, by becoming one of their number. She renounced her home, her car and her salary for three years, “sold her possessions, rejected her health insurance and pension benefits, and committed herself to living among the homeless and others on the margins of society.”

Last August, she was cited for sleeping on a park bench near the Alamo and sentenced to ten hours community service at the local homeless shelter she already spent most of her time volunteering at. She told the judge to stuff it.

“It was this criminalization of those who are poor that I was trying to protest,” she said, explaining, “all I do is community service.”

As a result, a warrant was issued for her arrest.

“I turned myself in, and went to jail,” she said. “After a few hours, I was told to leave, and that I was going to be fined.

“I actually don’t have money to pay the fine, of course, so there’s already another warrant out.”

So, Andrade-Smith said, “I need to go back and turn myself in. I’m intentional about going through the process to see what homeless people go through.”

“My concern is not my arrest,” she said, “it’s with the indifference about people who are poor and living on the streets. There’s a whole new landscape with people living on the streets in the United States,” she observed, noting that the economic recession had plunged some middle class families into poverty.

…“I will never be homeless per se — I have my church, I have my title ‘reverend,’ I have my family,” she said. “I have all this privilege that will prevent me from understanding fully, but I am trying my best.”

Matthew 5:3, doing it right.

from The Agonist - thoughtful, global, timely (By: (author unknown)) http://bit.ly/KuNJeu

The Thing - First Week of Winter

The Thing - MacReady

Giclee prints on Heavy Matte Archival Paper

$100 (each)

24” x 36”

Signed and numbered 

Limited editions of 50

The Thing - First Week of Winter

The Thing - MacReady




from Fro Design Co Store (By: Fro Design Co) http://bit.ly/K2pM1z

theatlantic:

In Focus: The American West, 150 Years Ago

In the 1860s and 70s, photographer Timothy O’Sullivan created some of the best-known images in American History. After covering the U.S. Civil War, (many of his photos appear in this earlier series), O’Sullivan joined a number of expeditions organized by the federal government to help document the new frontiers in the American West. The teams were composed of soldiers, scientists, artists, and photographers, and tasked with discovering the best ways to take advantage of the region’s untapped natural resources. O’Sullivan brought an amazing eye and work ethic, composing photographs that evoked the vastness of the West. He also documented the Native American population as well as the pioneers who were already altering the landscape. Above all, O’Sullivan captured — for the first time on film — the natural beauty of the American West in a way that would later influence Ansel Adams and thousands more photographers to come. 

See more. [Images: Timothy O’Sullivan/LOC]

citythatbreeds:

Talk is cheap at Luskin’s

transitmaps:

Hey, everyone! I’m thrilled to be able to share some news with you that I just heard about! My U.S. Highways as Subway Map has been accepted for inclusion in the inaugural edition of the NACIS Atlas of Design. There were 150 entries, and only 27 maps - all by different creators - have been accepted, so you can see why I’m excited about this!

The Atlas itself promises to be superb, as evidenced by this excerpt from the project website:

The Atlas will feature a gallery of full-color maps showcasing cartography at its most beautiful, its cleverest, its sharpest, and its most intriguing. But it will be more than a museum of images; each map will be accompanied by thoughtful commentary that guides the reader toward a deeper understanding of the work: its inspiration and message, the ways it means to influence us. It is well to look upon something beautiful and good, but once we understand how it is beautiful and good, our experience becomes much richer. For those of us who make maps, we can carry those lessons into our own work and advance the craft of cartography. Even if you don’t make maps, it’s a chance to gain insight into what mapmakers really do, and to see how it’s about more than just pushing city dots and rivers around. Everyday objects become much more significant when we see what is behind their creation.

I can’t wait to see the other maps! For those of you unfamiliar with my work, here’s a link to the map’s project page on my personal website, as well as a link to a big (4000px wide!) version of the map on Flickr - the best way to appreciate all the fine detail.

chrissiegle:

Ever’s mural for Open Walls Baltimore at Charles St and North Ave

nprfreshair:

How Common Is Your Birthday?

(via @stiles)

sexinbmore:

Ok - I saw this and just couldn’t help but laugh #GeekGirl