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Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Two Questions for Tuesday

Two geographic questions plagued me on Monday.

The most recent On the Media (from National Public Radio) is all about Facebook and its upcoming initial public offering (IPO). One of the experts, who wrote about the company, refers to the company in the context of a country. She calls it "Facebookistan." Here's a challenge for geographers of all ages: In how many ways is Facebook like a country? In how many ways is it different? I think that'd make a great essay question!

The other question relates to a tweet I saw Monday morning. Here's the full text of it.
City launches new #GIS that uses #ESRI web #map s and apps: ow.ly/8TCh8 via @emtpej
The original tweet, and this version, are from individuals involved in EMS. The odd thing about these messages?  The lack of a city name/location. Does it matter which city? Apparently not. Why not? Are all cities about the same to those of us in the business? I find that lack of location of the city, when discussing its use of location technology both ironic and a bit meta. The city, by the way, is Southland, Michigan. Maybe the authors could not easily determine that in the article in Hometown Life. That online paper does not make "which hometown" it's talking about very clear.