#TED : John Green on Paper Towns and Why Learning is Awesome
the manner in which we map the world changes the world.
▻https://www.ted.com/talks/john_green_the_nerd_s_guide_to_learning_everything_online?language=en
Agloe, New York, is very famous to cartographers, because it’s a paper town. It’s also known as a copyright trap. Mapmakers — because my map of New York and your map of New York are going to look very similar, on account of the shape of New York — often, mapmakers will insert fake places onto their maps, in order to protect their copyright. Because then, if my fake place shows up on your map, I can be well and truly sure that you have robbed me.
Agloe is a scrabblization of the initials of the two guys who made this map, Ernest Alpers and Otto [G.] Lindberg, and they released this map in 1937. Decades later, Rand McNally releases a map with Agloe, New York, on it, at the same exact intersection of two dirt roads in the middle of nowhere.
Well, you can imagine the delight over at General Drafting. They immediately call Rand McNally, and they say, “We’ve caught you! We made Agloe, New York, up. It is a fake place. It’s a paper town. We’re going to sue your pants off!” And Rand McNally says, “No, no, no, no, Agloe is real.” Because people kept going to that intersection of two dirt roads in the middle of nowhere, expecting there to be a place called Agloe — someone built a place called Agloe, New York.
[...]
I believe that what we map changes the life we lead. I believe that while maps don’t show you where you will go in your life, they show you where you might go. You very rarely go to a place that isn’t on your personal map.
La carte et le territoire d’Internet...
(Le discours parle de bien plus que juste la cartographie. Ca parle de « communities of learners » sur Internet)
Transcript :
▻https://www.ted.com/talks/john_green_the_nerd_s_guide_to_learning_everything_online/transcript?language=en
poke @reka
