In the “Introduction to Web Mapping”, the author, Jim Detwiler, provides an interesting discussion on the development of online cartography since the first map was placed on the Internet. Once a simple image held up with a few strings of HTML, maps are now expected to be highly interactive and specific. Most important in his overview, in my opinion, is the author’s insistence on arguing for the benefits of both paper and web-based maps. Reviewing the impressive development of online cartography since the first map was scanned and placed on the Internet, the author spends an equal amount of time on the benefits of paper maps – including its mobility as a service that doesn’t require Internet access, extreme high-definition quality that is incredibly difficult to put on a screen, and reliability as a product produced by certified experts rather than cartography hobbyists editing open source code. Interestingly, Detwiler helpfully injects an element of perspective supporting online cartography as he reveals European countries seem to value online cartography more because they don’t have the same kind of open-information regarding mapping that Americans do. As a result of the internet and online cartography, individuals from European countries are able to build for themselves a network of information regarding geography within their own living network.
While I am relatively new to John Green and his books, Detwiler’s discussion of cartography on and off the internet immediately reminded me of his novel Paper Towns and its preoccupation with paper towns – fictional towns arbitrarily created by mapping companies to ensure that a map is fairly copyrighted and not reproduced by a rival mapping company. Arguably most famous of these towns is Agloe, New York, the city prominently featured in Green’s novel. Strangely enough, because the town was published by the creators, the map’s users actually began to visit the point of the map labeled “Algoe” and had enough visitors to encourage the development of a general store. While more of a copyright trap than an innocent mistake, people actually visiting this spot on the map demonstrates the ramifications the error had that could have come from both experts and hobbyists alike. Both striving to preserve their ownership of the object they are working towards, expert cartographers and their ownership of their product and hobbyists and their ability to continue to contribute to a product they have worked on, today’s reading revealed to me the problem that both paper and electronic materials both suffer from. Both are created by an individual and, are therefore, susceptible to error, intentional or not. As objects providing security and guidance during travel, maps shouldn’t be error prone and hopefully, will become less so.