The most excellent Tumblr of the Sunlight Foundation
1955 Map Shows No-Go Zones for Soviet Travelers in the U.S.
If you were one of select few private Soviet citizens granted permission to visit the United States in 1955, you could take in a Cubs game or ski Jackson Hole, but if you wanted to sample Memphis barbecue or check out the factories in Youngstown, Ohio, you’d be out of luck. That’s because a National Security Council directive had, on Jan. 3, 1955, allowed some “Soviet citizens in possession of valid Soviet passports” into the country, while extending controls previously placed on visiting Soviet diplomats and official representatives to apply to their travel.
53 years of nuclear tests as electronic music
I’ve seen this video described as a musical depiction of all the nuclear bombs ever detonated. But that sort of makes it sound like you’re about to get a particularly bombastic version of the 1812 Overture. Instead, “1945-1998” by Isao Hashimoto is more like an infographic with sound effects — or, possibly, a mash-up of the games Simon and Global Thermonuclear War.
Inequality & Mass Transit in the Bay Area
A recent feature in The New Yorker juxtaposed New York City’s subway stops with their residents’ incomes. Like NYC, San Francisco has people of both extreme poverty and wealth, often living toe-to-toe. We wondered how those graphs would look in our neck of the woods. The results show the Bay Area’s economic inequality and its relationship with transit and urban form.
YouTube Trends map shows most popular videos by region
I don’t know about you, but when I go to YouTube, I check my subscriptions and then look at what videos are currently popular. Because you know, it’s important to stay up to date on the most current news about kittens, people getting caught doing weird things, and movie trailers. The YouTube Trends Map is another way to see what’s popular, but from a geographic and demographic point of view.
10 Hours In Our Cat’s Day
Chris Evans sez, “I made this 8bit London Underground map a while ago, entirely in Tile Studio with a bit of Gimp to add text.”
It’s the most comprehensive map of US biodiversity ever made.
Metro cuff bracelets by Design Hype
The Frustration of San Francisco’s Mass-Transit Riders, Visualized
City Plates are 12-inch porcelain plates that have grid maps of 24 different cities on them, from Boston to Brasilia to Berlin.
Real-time map of all forests on Earth launches next month
An online map that tracks in near real-time the vegetation area of all the world’s forests simultaneously will launch next month, after a preview was shown at a United Nations summit yesterday. Called “Global Forest Watch 2.0,” the map is a project years in the making led by the World Resources Institute, a nonprofit advocacy group focused on ecological issues.
One Million Photos Taken From the International Space Station
Nate Bergey has created several data visualizations using 1,129,177 photos taken from the International Space Station. Since most images from the ISS are of land masses, Bergey found that plotting all of the images creates a fuzzy map of the world.
Data Dive: Which comes first? Closed schools or blighted neighborhoods?
As Chicago closes public schools, a question arises: Do school closings contribute to a community’s downward spiral — or are they a symptom?
