Alan Brandon

I loved this excellent article by Julia Turner on Slate about hand-drawn maps — the kind of maps you draw so your cousin can find your house, or your buddy can find the boat launch. In these days of Map Quest, Google Maps, and turn-by-turn GPS directions, a hand-drawn map can seem like an anachronism. But when you sketch out a route on a Burger King napkin you’re providing better clarity, customization, and resolution than the latest smart phone app.

The crucial advantage of the handmade map is that it is designed for a particular person confronting a particular task.

Like good technical documentation, a casual hand-drawn map is designed for a specific purpose. It therefore leaves out the unnecessary bits and simplifies the presentation of the key information as much as possible. Take roads for example:

Handmade maps also tend toward straight lines and right angles, a phenomenon spatial psychologists refer to as “rectilinear normalization.” The world is full of squiggly roads that intersect at oblique angles. When we envision space, though, we tend to reduce such complexities to relatively simple geometric forms.

And one more example of how hand-drawn maps are like tech docs:

Another advantage of personal cartography: Homemade maps often include error indicators, signs that you’ve taken a wrong turn or gone too far.

Turner provides a link to the Hand Drawn Map Association website, which is worth checking out as well.

(Slate via Boingboing)
(map: Laura Watson via Slate)

You can’t play Facebook games on the iPad.

The much anticipate Apple iPad everything-killer is coming, due to arrive in consumers’ hands this Saturday. Previews and reviews abound, and while there seems to be a lot to love about the iPad there are also a few complaints. One of the biggest gripes is the device’s lack of Flash support. Many, many websites run on flash, but Apple appears to be taking a firm stand against the ubiquitous technology. The reasons for their anti-Flash stance are plentiful, and alternatives seem scant.  Apple is taking a gamble here.

Apple’s intended iPad customer is the casual computer user who wants to check email, listen to music, watch a movie, read the paper, and surf the web. But when these customers visit Facebook on their iPad, they are in for a shock. The majority of the popular social games run on Flash.

Farmville (and the other ‘ville games), Cafe World, Lexulous, Bejeweled Blitz, and many other games depend on your browser having Flash installed to work. So the question is, will iPad customers (and potential iPad customers) be willing to give up their virtual horse stables and imaginary restaurants?

In a move reminiscent of the mid-90s browser compatibility wars, Apple has compiled a list of “iPad-ready websites”. Seriously? The list does include heavy hitters such as CNN, The New York Times, and The White House. But Facebook is the second most visited site on the Internet after Google. That’s a lot of online farmers to alienate.

Maybe a better question is “will Farmville kill the iPad?” — or at least change Apple’s stance on Flash?

Aptara, a publishing technology and process company, has released a nifty little video about publishing eBooks. The 2-minute video highlights the five things every publisher must do to successfully produce eBooks for readers such as the iPad, Kindle, and smart phones like the Android and iPhone.

(via The Content Wrangler)

I recently wrote two articles for Gizmag about UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles). The market for these small, maneuverable drones is really taking off (OK, pun intended). The CyberQuad is a high-end industrial model designed for surveillance in areas that may be too dangerous for humans. For example, the CyberQuad has been used to investigate a burning oil rig.

The other UAV I wrote about is the AR.Drone, a hobbyist gaming drone that you control using your iPhone with augmented reality!

This is cool. Researchers at Columbia University have developed an augmented reality device that can provide live, hands-on guidance for maintenance and repair tasks on military or other equipment. The ARMAR system combines sensors and a head-mounted display to guide technicians through repair and maintenance procedures while they perform the procedure. This eliminates the need to flip back and forth between a manual and the task at hand.

But here’s an idea: What if instead of leafing through pages or scrolling through an online manual, you could simply see your way through a task? Just slide on a headset and work your way through a bit of customized, augmented-reality education.

Check out the full article at O’Reilly Radar.