August 22, 2005

More Geographical Coolness via the Internet

Thanks to the Maximum Leader for pointing this one out!

The world is crisscrossed by our navigational coordinates, latitude and longitude.

A confluence is defined as a flowing together; a meeting place (often of rivers). In our case a degree confluence is the exact spot where an integer degree of latitude and an integer degree of longitude meet.

Every person on earth lives within 50 miles of a degree confluence, and the world is dotted by 64,442 of these. Someone had the brilliant idea to have people visit each one and take a photograph, to be collected into one place and shared. Proof of visit is supplied by snapping a screen shot of a handheld GPS unit on the spot (or within a reasonable distance in some cases).

Of course, many are in the middle of the ocean, or located on the ice packs up where Santa lives (and his Summer home down South). So if someone visits one of those, it's great, but they're concentrating on the land-based confluences.

Maybe one is near you?

Posted by Ted at August 22, 2005 11:17 AM | TrackBack
Category: Links
Comments

Cool beans!This makes me eager to fire up my Garmin this winter.I think I gotta go huntin' now.Winter camping anyone?Why not now,you ask?My e-Trex doesn't work that keen under canopy.

Posted by: Russ at August 22, 2005 04:57 PM

I'm not close to one now, but I lived within a block of 40°N 83°W for over a year, and never realized it.

Posted by: buckethead at August 22, 2005 05:03 PM

Hmmm. Looks like everything near me has already been photographed several times. Oh, well. Kinda neat to search through the archives, though!

Posted by: Tuning Spork at August 22, 2005 10:40 PM
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