Spatially Connected

What does your favorite map projection say about you??

Randall Munroe @ XKCD has a great comic on his blog:  http://xkcd.com/977/

From the Oregon Commons Website: 

"Do you appreciate local parks and national forests? What about clean drinking water and your public library? Do you find the Internet useful? Could you get by without fresh air?

Some things are no one’s private property—They belong to all of us. They not only enhance our lives and our communities, they make life possible. In a society that is overly focused on the market economy, our common assets are eroding and in need of attention. The work of cultivating the commons depends on growing our awareness, our network, and our commitment to the common good.

Join us for Mapping the Commons, an interactive workshop in which we jointly explore the scope and diversity of the commons. The more knowledgeable and connected we are, the better we will be able to serve as stewards of the commons."

Click here to sign up for the workshop.  The dates are Oct 8, Oct 30, and Nov 19, 2011

"Maps for Change is an organization dedicated to empowering people with GIS skills to be practitioners and volunteers by bringing people with GIS skills and NGOs together.  

Maps for Change includes both students that are seeking practical opportunities for their GIS classes as well as GIS professionals from around the world. "

If you are a student looking for some practical GIS experience, check out this opportunity. 

https://sites.google.com/site/mapsforchange/

An interactive map put out by the NY times that shows the election results in a variety of ways.  For example how people voted based on their race, median income, religion, employment status, and education level, among others. 

check it out!

http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/explorer.html
 

"Sure, the Columbia River divides Washington and Oregon, but what explains the other boundaries of our state? Why are the county lines where they are, and how have they changed over the years?

Using maps from his own personal collection, historian Robert Hamm will show how cartographic processes changed from the 1500′s to the late 1800′s, and how people saw their world."

http://wvlibrary.wordpress.com/2011/07/01/dewey-talks-about-oregon-history-through-maps-thursday-july-7/

Check out some of these maps for inspiration!

http://www.conservationgis.org/scgis/2011contest.html

If you want to take a look at the proposed Oregon redistricting,  follow the link below for info and an interactive map. 
http://www.leg.state.or.us/redistricting/ 

The list was obtained from the article, "Online Map games to encourage & engages your geographic awareness"  in GISUser.com.  here is the link to the full article:  http://www.gisuser.com/content/view/23043/222/

1. MapDuel: www.mapduel.com

This one may give you a bit of vertigo with all the zooming around, but it is the only one I've found with a question / answer format. It covers the whole globe. I did find one glitch. In a bonus question it asked me, "What is the language of this country?" when it was referring to a U.S. state. Be sure to click on the "Where the hell is Matt?" link too.

2. MapGame: http://www.rethinkingschools.org/just_fun/games/mapgame.html

Not a competitive game but the fact that it focuses on Middle Eastern and Northern Africa countries makes it pertinent to current events in that region.

3. States: http://www.sporcle.com/games/states.php

To win this game you must type in the names of all 50 states in 10 minutes. It places the name of the state that you've just typed in its proper location. Don't forget Alaska and Hawaii (or New Jersey).

4. 50states: http://www.addictinggames.com/50states.html

With this game you have to drag and drop a state shape to where it belongs on a U.S. map. It allows you to get it mostly right via snapping within a certain tolerance. You can compete with others for the best score.

An exhibition at the University of Michigan is meant to inspire cross-disciplinary discussion on how to best track and communicate human activity and scientific progress on a global scale. It has two components: the physical part supports the close inspection of high quality reproductions of maps for display at conferences and education centers; the online counterpart provides links to a selected series of maps and their makers along with detailed explanations of how these maps work. The exhibit is a 10-year effort. Each year, 10 new maps are added resulting in 100 maps total in 2014.

Check on the online exhibition:  http://scimaps.org/

Celebrating a thirty-year partnership between the Library of Congress and the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping (ACSM), the Maps in Our Lives exhibition explores surveying, cartography, geodesy, and geographic information systems--and draws on both the Library's historic map collections and the ACSM collection in the Library of Congress.


Check it out:  http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/maps/