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A new kind of map: it’s about time

blog.mapbox.com

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Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#121

Post by erikb »

shurcooL wrote: post #61

I think this is great, but I can see it being potentially improved further if there was a temporary overlay of the physical map whenever you hover over a destination. Basically, I feel that completely removing the physical map is okay until you've picked a target. Then, having to click on it to be able to see what the route looks like (which streets to take, etc.) is higher friction than I'd like. Instead, imagine if…

I think the idea is to keep mobile and desktop in sync here. And mobile doesn't have a "finger over" event I think.

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#122

Post by Boothroid »

npolet wrote: post #49

This is a pretty neat idea, and I could see myself using this in day to day life. It's nice to see real thought, study and execution into new ways of portraying things that have the possibility of becoming stale. While maps and their functionalities are very much "still in development" with many developers adding new features to them... most of these "new features" don't try to rethink how we see and use them. They j…

You don't think there are thousands of people working on exactly this stuff already?! There is deep research into this in academia and the private sector which has been going on for decades :|

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#123

Post by erikb »

I've met with people from the Berlin mapbox team and feel they are a nice bunch.

However this map idea also reflects my core impression. Really smart people that provide constant high quality content (just look at the blog itself, how it's designed, and the other posts), but not really a disruptive spirit.

Sie sind nicht der Elefant im Porzelanladen, you could say. That is their strength and their weakness.

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#127

Post by LambdaComplex »

erikb wrote: post #121
shurcooL wrote: post #61

I think this is great, but I can see it being potentially improved further if there was a temporary overlay of the physical map whenever you hover over a destination. Basically, I feel that completely removing the physical map is okay until you've picked a target. Then, having to click on it to be able to see what the route looks like (which streets to take, etc.) is higher friction than I'd like. Instead, imagine if…

I think the idea is to keep mobile and desktop in sync here. And mobile doesn't have a "finger over" event I think.

Press and hold?

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#128

Post by bhntr3 »

chippy wrote: post #97
nerdponx wrote: post #76

By removing literal geography, we now have a map that more closely reflects the way we think about our environment: a cluster of restaurants “five minutes that way” versus “ten minutes the other.” Speak for yourself! I feel way more confident getting around when I know the actual geography.

As a geographer I cringed. The article was written in a way that made it sound a bit more important than it actually is, and I think that quote was one of it. A designer finding geography and cartography for the first time. It IS good stuff though. Maybe the writing is stylised and maybe not as humble as usual techy writing? People do think about space and the environment in spatial terms and also in time. This artic…

Yeah. This is showy and really cool. But it seems kind of unnecessary to make it "a map"

In terms of solving real problems, I don't see it as functionally any better than a list ordered by distance with a small compass showing directionality. Basically what you see on the left when you search google maps for "pizza in san francisco".

The benefit of that list is that it uses space much more efficiently and can show things like ratings and thumbnails. Whereas in the article's ui, you have to click on every circle to see what it is.

Put another way, maps are incredibly information dense but when you remove most of the information from them, they're just dense.

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#129

Post by adrianratnapala »

bllguo wrote: post #119
chippy wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a geographer I cringed. The article was written in a way that made it sound a bit more important than it actually is, and I think that quote was one of it. A designer finding geography and cartography for the first time. It IS good stuff though. Maybe the writing is stylised and maybe not as humble as usual techy writing? People do think about space and the environment in spatial terms and also in time. This artic…

I don't see the article arguing that all maps should be replaced with this visualization. It's a much better map for certain tasks. Of course you lose information by throwing out geography.

The issue is that people slide from it being a good map for some particular purpose to some blanket claim that all people really need to know is is . The old classic case of this is geographically challenged reporters raphsodising about the London tube map https://tfl.gov.uk/maps/track/tube.

I love the London tube map, but when I lived there, it was all the more useful to me because I look at other maps so that I could know that certain stations were in easy walking distance from each other or some other place I was going to.

Re: A new kind of map: it’s about time

#130

Post by lucb1e »

erikb wrote: post #123

I've met with people from the Berlin mapbox team and feel they are a nice bunch. However this map idea also reflects my core impression. Really smart people that provide constant high quality content (just look at the blog itself, how it's designed, and the other posts), but not really a disruptive spirit. Sie sind nicht der Elefant im Porzelanladen, you could say. That is their strength and their weakness.

"You are not the elephant in a cupboard full of porcelain", that means, by the way.
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