Monday, July 5, 2010

Arts on the Map

Lovers of Australian art can now search interactively for… Arts on the Map. This map centric website was published by the Australian Council for the Arts and features nearly 200 companies currently funded by the Council. Visitors can use a very simple yet quite attractive interactive search widget to query a database of various artforms or art companies in each State and Territory. The results are displayed as a side list and interactive markers on the map. There is also an alternative search option for stories published by individual art companies. The mapping application comes in two flavours, as Google Map or Google Earth version.




It is good to see that Google Maps and similar free online mapping applications have a wide range of potential uses. The truth is that if it wasn’t for Google, there would be no such interactive applications on the Internet. Before Google launched its maps such functionality was reserved only for expensive and/or technically challenging software that many could not afford, or would never contemplate, to deploy on their websites.

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