Thursday, December 27, 2012

2012 Top 10 Google Maps Mania Posts

Yesterday I posted a list of the top five most read posts on Google Maps Mania in 2012. Here are then next five most read posts.

The most popular posts included a surprising number of maps of fictional worlds. One other surprise to me was that a post about the U.S. election didn't make it into the top ten but a post about the French election results did just creep in at number ten in the list.

No. 6: The Last Voyage of Costa Concordia Mapped


In January the live ship tracking website Marine Traffic showed the track of the cruise ship Costa Concordia just before it crashed into the island of Giglio in the Mediterranean Sea.

I'm not sure if the track still exists on Marine Traffic but amazingly you can now see the wreck of the Costa Concordia on Google Maps (click on the screenshot above).

No. 7: A Game of Thrones on Google Maps


Westeros Map is a Google Map of the fictional continent of Westeros from George Raymond Richard Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire fantasy novels.

No. 8: Real-Time Tracking via Google Maps


Track on the Map
is a handy Google Maps based application that allows you to quickly and easily share your real-time movements with the world.

To use Track on the Map you just need to view the application with a GPS enabled device, such as your smart phone. You can add a user name and select an appropriate icon and that's all you have to do.

No. 9: Mapping the World of Minecraft

Mindfold
is a service that provides unlimited on-demand servers for the game Minecraft (10 hours a month free - subscribe for unlimited play). Anyone who creates a Minecraft world in Minefold gets an interactive Google Map of their world. Checkout the 'Explore' page to browse through all the maps created so far.

You don't have to join Minefold though to create a Google Map of a Minecraft world. Minecraft Overviewer and Tectonicus are Minecraft world renderers that allow users to create a Google Map of their Minecraft game.

No. 10: French Election Results Live on Google Maps


The Google Politics and Elections website featured a Google Map that displayed the results live for each electoral department in the French elections in April.