The old days of pins 'n strings on a cork board have been over for some time now, but the practice of planning our work continues. Years ago I was the sales manager at CBN, and when I brought a new account's paperwork into Bob's office, he would get excited, jump up from his desk and go over to a large map we had on the wall. Bob would then select a colored pin with a number, the color representing the frequency that we would clean the account, the number representing the account's ID number. These pins would be grouped with a string, that represented 'the route'. There was a visceral feeling of pride that we all felt in our wall map ritual. Google's mapping technology definitely changed that.
Today we use digital mapping to efficiently route customer service visits, inspections, floor crew assignments, and to spot trends. Digital mapping technology has improved our operational efficiency and helps us to better serve our clients. But for the nostalgia we wouldn't go back to pins 'n strings.
I bring this up because I read this article in Fast Company about maps and how they help us understand the world and events, in this case Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The idea of crowd sourcing maps with information content can also be paired with cloud based webcams and drones to help us see and understand what's happening in the world in real time.
There are some very interesting links in the article that suggest that they might be better than the good old Penguin Atlas, although the sites linked in the article do have a lot of ads, while a used but good Penguin Atlas could be picked up at the annual Visiting Nurse Service Auxiliary book sale for cheap.
https://www.fastcompany.com/90733391/theres-a-lot-you-dont-see-in-maps-of-the-war-in-ukraine-heres-how-to-look-at-them-differently
Here are two links from the article, it may take a bit of effort to get to the good stuff.
https://liveuamap.com
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2022/02/27/follow-the-russia-ukraine-monitor-map
by Bill Black
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