• Urban Exploration – My Life Under Bridge

    Recently I’ve been exploring the development of an “outdoor adventure” brand and in my market research I ran across this Wikipedia article on urban exploration: Urban exploration (often shortened as urbex or UE) is the exploration of man-made structures, usually abandoned ruins or not usually seen components of the man-made environment. Photography and historical interest/documentation…

  • New Kindle Fires Sparks Interest in Google Maps App Post

    My Map Strings web site has made $6.50 in ad clicks this month vs. ‘nothing’ most months (a 22,000% increase). I’m assuming this has something to do with Apple maps, but let’s look at the data: Visits started going up Sep 5 and peaked on Sep 6 at 42 visits a day, but averaged 30…

  • Map Pins and World Maps

    While not expensive, the types of map pins you choose can greatly affect the way your wall maps end up looking over time. Whether you’re displaying your map behind glass, in a restaurant, or in a corporate environment, you’re going to want to choose from a selection of different types of map pins. Map pins…

  • Custom Maps

    How I went from being a map blogger to a map maker by just realizing that I love to make custom maps for myself and others. I always thought of myself as an urban planner anytime I encountered something while driving that didn’t make sense. I used to wish I could change city streets the…

  • Geospatial Providers for GIS

    GIS stands for “Geographic Information System”, which is a technology that allows the user to produce and interact with many types of maps. This is a list of geospatial providers that use GIS. Esri: Tools and data by the company that helped develop geospatial information systems, Esri is firmly entrenched in government IT shops where…

  • GPS Devices at Pilot vs. Amazon vs. Waze

    GPS devices at Pilot range from $299 to $449 with two models for $349. They also have the new Monster Rehab, which is Iced Tea, Lemonade, and Energy in a can with a black-top lid. It’s delicious. Another thing I saw there was a new type of Dorito-type chip called Tias, which looked delicious, but…

  • Google Maps Query String Parameters

    The following is a list of query string parameters that can be passed to Google Maps. These arguments are helpful if you want to get Google Maps to display driving directions, which are not available under the API. Query Translation q= “q” stands for “query” and anything passed in this parameter is treated as if…