“Satellite Map” of Bad Language on Twitter

This was all over the Web yesterday: a map of bad language use on Twitter. But two headlines that noted the isopleth map was a “satellite map” were awesome. More awesome? One commenter at the Daily Mail knows his maps!

Nothing to do with “satellite”... any map, even a hand drawn one could have been used. The image is computer generated based on “Twitter” messages. The Hotspots just match the populated areas as empty fields don’t twitter much.
- Crazy News, UK, 24/1/2011 21:46

- Daily Mail

Education Tidbits

Postings on Twitter reflect some well-known regionalisms, such as Southerners’ “y’all,” and Pittsburghers’ “yinz,” and the usual regional divides in references to soda, pop and Coke. But Jacob Eisenstein, a post-doctoral fellow in CMU’s [Carnegie Mellon] Machine Learning Department, said the automated method he and his colleagues have developed for analyzing Twitter word use shows that regional dialects appear to be evolving within social media.

In northern California, something that’s cool is “koo” in tweets, while in southern California, it’s “coo.” In many cities, something is “sumthin,” but tweets in New York City favor “suttin.” While many of us might complain in tweets of being “very” tired, people in northern California tend to be “hella” tired, New Yorkers “deadass” tired and Angelenos are simply tired “af.”

- Science Daily, hat tip to reader Jim

Over in Pottstown, PA there’s a series of monthly workshops for teens through the spring. Details on the January program:

The January program will be “Learning How to Geocache.” GIS systems provided. Each month a program will focus on a recreation or environmental theme and be followed by a hike at the park. Hike terrain is medium difficulty; distance is approximately two miles.

- The Mercury

The California State University at Stanislaus is launching a distance learning GIS certificate program starting in April. 

- GIS Lounge

New requirements for data sharing and data management for anyone getting NSF grants. Good stuff!

- NSF via @timoreilly

“PhD in mobile Human-Computer Interaction, Citizen Science & motivation of VGI. Open to EU/UK candidates”

- link via @mhacklay

Estonian Coin’s Map: Russia Included?

Estonia’s introduction of the euro has sparked controversy after it was claimed that a map of the tiny Baltic country on the new Estonian one euro coin appears to include a chunk of neighbouring Russia.

Mistake or was it a provocation?

- The Telegraph
- More on the topic from the Estonian Free Press

Quote of the Week II

Members of the Virginia Company employed a series of navigational tools to make their First Landing in what is now Virginia Beach in the 1600s. Unfortunately, Google Maps and the Garmin Nuvi 3790T were not among them.

- A correction at HamptonRoads.com (It’s classy to make corrections like this; I do it all the time!)

Dept. of Redundany Dept.

Lake County Commissioners this week approved the final draft of a professional services agreement with Schneider Corporation, which will now begin collecting the necessary data for a Geographic Information System system.

- Madison Daily Leader