Blog about engagement with google earth.

I like to use google earth and google maps to find locations and to explore them before I visit them for the first time. One example of this was when I was supposed to meet some friends at a movie theater in Chicago which I have never been to. I used google maps’ satellite view to see which major features I could see. Since none of the buildings had very differing features, I used streetview feature which let me see details that I would have seen only if I would have been there before. I remembered a couple of surroundings, like a restaurant not too far away. Once, I arrived in the general area, I started looking for things which I saw on the map, sure enough, I almost immediately found the restaurant and not too far away, I located the movie theater which I was supposed to go to. I also arrived there first. Apparently the group I was supposed to meet was busy looking for the theator. I think that the streetview is especially a great feature that is built into google maps. It doesn’t confine you to just viewing rooftops, but very detailed pictures of the local area.

week 5: creating maps

I chose to map out “Personal Income Per Capita” for each of the US States. I chose to map this topic just out of curiosity if I can find some patterns and see if I could see if I could possibly explain the numbers. This map could be used by businesses or people to look up which states to move to. Usually the ones with the higher numbers have a higher standard of living. The data comes from the US Census so the source is reliable and unbiased. I used different intervals for the different maps. Map1 used Jenk’s natural breaks and Map2 used equal intervals. Map1 could be more useful to see the top states which have a greater personal income per capita. The equal interval map could be used more naturally since usually you assume that different colors represent equal intervals. The maps are fairly equivalent and I think the only states that differ are the states with the higher incomes which are related to the tourism and business that goes on in those states.

Map1 using equal intervals.

Map2 using equal intervals.

week 4: bike racks

We are going to map bike racks. The center of the map would be the quad. We found a map on the uiuc website that shows some of the bigger bike racks but most buildings don’t have a bike rack shown, even though most have a bike rack somewhere.

week 3: oil galore

Both maps show the location of where an event took place. One is plainer and just shows location while the other one shows a more detailed time lapse of an oil spill. I think both maps serve the purposes for the relevant news articles. One is simple because the corresponding article is more of a minor news story that got more attention than it would have normally because of the oil spill in the Gulf. The time lapse map of the oil spill on the other hand provides lots of information which I think is appropriate for such a large event in the news. The oil rig explosion just shows the location of the rig. The oil spill time lapse shows lots of overlays of the oil slick and satellite images. Both maps are neutral, in my opinion, because they provide only the information that is associated with the story. There really aren’t any ambiguous places that are on the map. But one thing I would like to point out is that a similar story seemed to have a larger area of oil displayed, which could mean that this map might have only shown oil for oil slicks that were over a certain threshold. I can’t think of a way to make the maps more useful. I think the maps are well made and they could provide an initial visual representation of how large each of the events is. The oil spill had a large map showing large amounts of oil. The explosion only had a single point representing the explosion. Both of them could influence how the reader interprets the magnitude of the event. The maps are have related topics but not the same topics. The explosion might have been more sensationalized since a related incident occurred a short time ago. Another map could have showed wildlife population density to cater to wildlife experts and people interested in the environmental impacts of the spill.

links for week3

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/oil-spill-map.htm

Coast Guard: Platform on fire in Gulf; 13 workers rescued

week 2: virtual tourism

When I visited the Great Pyramids, I could immediately spot them even at a very small scale. It was right on the desert as I had expected it to, but the Pyramids were also right on the edge of the city, Cairo, Egypt, which surprised me. Also, there seemed to be what looked like a golf course nearby which I did not expect near any pyramids. Another thing I learned was that the sphinx is not very close to any pyramids which I had expected it to. I think Google Earth does provide an accurate view of the world. One thing I did find out was that it has a “flight mode” which lets you fly in an airplane so to speak. What I thought was missing was more detail, especially 3d detail. Also another thing that Google Earth can’t reproduce was the feeling of actually being there. It can only simulate your sense of vision, but nothing else.  I did find out that they do have 3d models of the Sphinx and the Pyramids which I thought was neat.

When I visited Siberia, I saw that it was actually a very large piece of land, much larger then what I had expected. I also didn’t expect to find large cities in Siberia. At first I couldn’t find the cities because it looked like a blur, but when I looked up major cities in Siberia, I was surprised to find ones that have a population of over 600,000 people like Barnaul. I read on Wikipedia that Siberia actually contains 25% of the Russian population (36,000,000 people). I found out that it isn’t a complete cold and desolate place which I have heard of in many stories. I’m sure the stories only portray the wilderness part of Siberia. I think Google Earth does a good job of portraying how vast Siberia is because you can easily see the borders and compare it to another large piece of land, like China. What I thought was missing was that it didn’t have very detailed photographs of the wilderness like they did of the cities which I thought could be used to explore remote regions which are otherwise inaccessible or almost inaccessible by humans.

Besides being used for virtual tourism, I think Google Earth can provide a means to plan out trips. I would think that it would be great for planning out road trips because you can view the roads and paths you can take before ever going on them.  This would reduce confusion when you finally go on a trip, but it could take away from the experience since you would already be familiar with the place before you ever got there. I think it could influence people because it will allow them to learn about other cultures (pictures have Wikipedia links). It could also allow them to learn about places more accurately then using opinions of others which may be inaccurate.

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