MYSOCIETY LAUNCHES MAPUMENTAL, RIVALS GOOGLE FOR WORLD DOMINATION

24/09/2009

Science fiction must be suffering.  After all those years obsessing over the inevitable automation of human endeavour, fiction scientists might be the only living beings without a vocation.  With no General Motors and no phantom menace of industry left to sustain those images of Barbican retro futurism, the labour less worldview of Messers Wells and Dick remains largely unrealised.

Fortunately, the neighbourly beneficents at mySociety are still flying the flag for forced unemployment.  Having, along with the entire new media industrial complex, waylaid journalism with one mighty login, mySociety has circled a new target - cartography.  In fairness, the recently launched Mapumental is more a tool than a trade, allowing users to plot their next home purchase based on an algorithm of accessibility and affordability.   And like mySociety’s other projects, Mapumental is not just easy to use; it also produces unexpected societal benefits.  Like giving the home-buying market its biggest boost since Kirstie Allsopp.

 Ryan Mahan