Merry Christmas!

Posted on December 24, 2007

I plan to get back to regular posts after the new year (if not sooner). Until then, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Wondering where Santa is right now?

NORAD’s tracking him for us with Google Maps, and in 3D with Google Earth (check out the animated videos, too).

Not familiar with this tradition? Here’s more about it and why they track Santa (read more here):

“For more than 50 years, NORAD and its predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) have tracked Santa.

The tradition began on Christmas Eve in 1955 after a Colorado Springs-based Sears Roebuck & Co. store advertisement for children to call Santa on a special “hotline” included an inadvertently misprinted telephone number. Instead of Santa, the phone number put kids through to the CONAD Commander-in-Chief’s operations “hotline.”

The Director of Operations, Colonel Harry Shoup had his staff check radar data for any indication of Santa making his way south from the North Pole. Indeed there were signs of Santa and children who called were given an update on Santa’s location. Thus, the tradition was born.

To listen to Colonel Shoup talk about the experience, click here.”

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LA homicides in 2007

Posted on August 12, 2007

Los Angeles has endured it’s share of violence. Seriously, it’s a tough city whose paper has to devote a daily blog to homicides, which is turning out to be an effective way of presenting their story that’s too big to fit in print.

The list represents an effort to provide comprehensive coverage of all homicides that occur in Los Angeles County. Overwhelmed by the sheer volume, the Los Angeles Times, like other major media organizations, covers only a fraction of the more than 1,000 murders in Los Angeles County each year. Many violent deaths become, in essence, private homicides — catastrophic on a small scale, invisible on a broader one.

Recently, they added an interactive map to better visually tell the story. The Baltimore Sun put together a similar map last month, but the Times’ version shows what you can do by adding more resources to the presentation.

The Times has integrated theirs with a bar graphic, photos, reader comments, a list of the deceased, and a search box. This is really impressive. I particularly like the photos and ability to leave comments. The editors have taken a stat-heavy, impersonal presentation (the map alone) and instantly have created an emotional link with the reader.

Here’s a sample comment posted by J.Henn that illustrates best what I mean:

Being a former LAPD officer I’ve been to more homicide scenes than I care to count. But seeing all these PEOPLE murdered is quite shocking,all these lives taken in a few short weeks. All these victims families devastated, in the blink of an eye. GOD bless the Victims and their Loved ones, and take vengeance on the ignorant murderers.

Another thing I like about this interactive: Readers can access the information in many ways, without the whole package seeming too repetitive. You can sort by date and then filter that information by age/ethnicity/gender/etc. Or you can search on your own. Once you get your data, you can click on the map and get the information. Or you can click on the name from a list.

Credits: Jill Leovy, a crime reporter for the Los Angeles Times, writes the blog. I don’t know if she created the interactive, too. No credits are listed on that page.

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Baltimore homicides in 2007

Posted on July 20, 2007

The Baltimore Sun put this map together as a part of their Confronting Crime series.

What an effective way to illustrate this series. You can search their interactive database of homicides so far this year, and click on a point to see who was killed where.

They say a picture is worth 1,000 words: Try a search for all blacks in all of 2007, then compare that map to all whites in all of 2007.

Holy crap.

Credits: Data compiled by Sun reporter Gus Sentementes using information from the City of Baltimore. Baltimoresun.com designer Stephen Mekosh produced the Google Map mashup.

UPDATE: I made a typo in the headline that was completely unintentional. It’s now fixed.

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For your mapping sweet tooth

Posted on July 11, 2007

Google today added more than 100 third party mashups to its MyMaps.

“It’s a really powerful innovation,” said John Hanke, Google’s director of maps. “It’s like combining chocolate and peanut butter. They’re good by themselves, but the combination is much more valuable than when they are served in isolation.”

I played around with it a bit, and I like. I did a real estate search in my area and found several listings in quite a user-friendly format.

This is the latest step in Google’s mashup evolution: In April, the company allowed readers to add text, photos and video to customized maps. In late June, they unveiled a feature that lets users easily change driving directions.

Newspapers better watch out. Google’s going even more local, and the opportunities are endless here. But then again, we’ve just been given some more powerful tools with embedding video and photos that I hope journalists will take advantage of.

Adding content to personalized maps:

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