'How Maps Change Things' Free Ebook on maps - available only until the end of march

[ravells]

You can get it here:

http://www.newint.com.au/freebook.Mercator.Bday/


Found on Cartotalk.

I should add that the one review by daan Strebe of the ebook on Cartotalk has been blisteringly unfavourable:

I have read the book. Presumably some people will find it eye-opening. I worry that many people will find it eye-closing.

Like all defenses of the Gall–Peters projection, the book obsesses over size disparities in maps as a proxy for cultural inequality. Never mind that the few studies on the topic show no such cognitive bias. Never mind that no one thinks the Greenland natives are at some pinnacle of human power and prestige by virtue of their apparently gigantic landholdings on the Mercator. Never mind that the Peters map strongly favors the mid latitudes—including Peters’s native Germany—while grossly distorting the very territories the Peters sympathizers claim they have rehabilitated.

...

I don’t think many cartographers are in danger of getting sucked into the reality distortion field of the book. Sadly, plenty of well-meaning lay people will, directing yet more energy into vapid, quasi-religious crusades which could otherwise go toward helping some actual need. Yes, the world needs more equality. No, the Peters map is no way to get there. This book breaks no new ground. If the author were truly interested in getting people to understand maps, he would advocate a diversity of projections and orientations rather than devoting the bulk of the book to Peters adulation.

For the full quote and thread go here (you may have to register).