Rikenography

First up is from a great couple of people who design subway maps for unlikely places. Take for example this map of a hypothetical subway system on the “Bar Harbor/Acadia Metro Area.” They offer a number of cool poster size maps on their website of various unlikely locations for subways. You can find them over at Transit Authority Figures.

Next up is an interesting slideshow from the New York Times about Michael Najjar, a photographer that uses mountain peak lines to express the rise and fall of the stock market. After finding a mountain in Argentina that already looked like a stock chart, he proceeded to go home and recreate new mountains that expressed real stock data. Here is the link.

While looking through some pictures of the old Terminal Station of Atlanta, (which is now a parking lot) I found a post over at infrastructurist ranking the top ten demolished train stations. It’s too bad these epic structures are gone, especially in light of the new push for high speed rail in the US. We can only imagine what it would be like to arrive at one of these stations in a modern train. Unfortunately I imagine there will never again be the desire or incentive to build such monuments to transportation. Number 1 on the list is naturally the original Penn Station, a true marvel of New York City:

This might be a tangential Riken’s Links but that doesn’t really matter. I’ve found a few interesting things I’ve wanted to show people so I guess this is the best place to do it.

First up was a really great video of the Trans Siberian Railway that has been matched with Google maps to its location as it travels across the length of the Russian nation. What is pretty great about the Google hosted page linked here, is that you can listen while traveling to the sound of the train, or if you want to put yourself in the position of the traveler, the books on tape of Tolstoy and Gogol. You can start in Moscow and either jump ahead to interesting sections, or travel the length of Siberia until you finally make it in Vladivostok. Also, the videos hosted on Youtube go to an amazingly clear 1080p HD. (Thanks to my brother James)

Next up I have a selection of info-graphics created by some very clever people. Susanna Hertrich has done some great work, but my favorite is one depicting the perception of risk and actual hazards:

Last up is another awesome visualization of the undersea cables that line the ocean’s floor sending the first international telegraphs and hosting current international interweb traffic.

I’m really into finding new things through Wikipedia, but not usually through searching for particular facts, but by starting somewhere unusual and then following the strands until I find even more unusual and of course wonderful things. It can lead to dead ends, but who cares – you can just start somewhere else.

So in homage to this love, I give you my favorite Wiki pages:

We’re going to start off with a little classic Wikipedia list - Accidents and Disasters by Death Toll. Taken at face value, it is a grim history of mankind, but once you start to explore the list by checking out particular incidents, you can discover the nooks and crannies of life around you, both now and in the past. The Nedelin Catastrophe in Kazakhstan is a perfect window into the Soviet Space Program and its home in Central Asia. Another interesting thing is the use of powerful nouns like Disaster, Calamity, Catastrophe – they sometimes account for the size of the event, but often they just accurately portray the emotional impact. If you don’t like flying or boats I’d recommend staying away from those sections.

Next up, Fregoli Disorder, where a person wrongfully believes that a series of different people are in fact one person, only dressed in different disguises. It’s an interesting read and has some noteworthy related links.

Wikipedia is also known for great Category sections and so far one of my favorites is the Stock Character Collection. It’s just great in its size and breadth.

The rest are up to you – check one out and see where it takes you. You might find something new and wonderful.

The Brevity Code

Urnfield Culture Numerals

The Vela Incident

Sound Symbolism (Phonosemantics)

Frederick Townsend Ward [A Favorite of Mine]

Sovereign Military Order of Malta

Rail Terminology

Charles H. Bonesteel III [It's his real name, and he's a badass]

Hello folks. Here’s another edition of links. This time I’m focusing less on any subject and will just share things I’ve have interested me recently. First comes a pretty cool but obscure article by a Japanese reporter about the mysteries surrounding Tokyo’s underground tunnels. Part conspiracy theory, part investigative journalism, it is a thoroughly interesting read.

Next is a really interesting dictionary site. Wordnik takes any word you enter and provides a comprehensive set of meanings, using different resources to let you appreciate the depth of a given word’s meaning. Using history, social uses, basic definitions, flickr tag matches and cool info-graphics, it provides a resource to which I give too much time.

Next is a thoroughly good read by Bruce Haley, The Tao of War Photography, in which he lays out the wisdom and peril of working in a war zone. There are some gems that get to the heart of the matter better than many have tried to do in expansive books. Here is a snippet:

“8.  If a rebel commander asks whether you would like to be buried in his country or your own, he may very well be serious and not just testing your resolve…”

This man knows what he’s talking about. He was one of the only photographers in Afghanistan during the 1980s Soviet occupation.

The rest of his site is quite interesting with an excellent collection of photos from his work in much of Asia, Africa, and Russia.

From words and photos we are going to move on to a few info-graphic selections. If you’ve read through the site before you’ll know I’m a fan of information visualization and lately I’ve been stumbling across quite a few interesting graphics.

The first shows visually the route, length and name of every space flight undertaken from Earth. Click on the picture to make it big.

Next is a map of the current account balance of the world’s nations. The units are in billions.

Next is a quite comprehensive visual explanation of America’s political landscape and the characteristics there-in. This one definately deserves a closer look by clicking on it and zooming in. Credit for the smart people who created this is on the bottom of the image itself.

That’s all for now. See you next time.

Here is a little wonderful clip of a novel approach to biking and catching a cab. Well done sirs, well done.