|
The
map is not the territory, but a map without regard for the actual
spatial composition of the territory it is supposed to represent
remains difficult to imagine for even the most perverted cartographic
sadist. However, maps that disobey territory are exactly what database
cartography produces.
In
a cartographic database all geographical items are stored as bits
of isolated data that require a pattern to make them meaningful.
These patterns, created by the cross linking of data generated according
to the specifications of search queries, are not maps in the classical
sense. They are flow charts or 'streetgrams' that visualize the
connections between the loci in the database: streets, specific
buildings, etc. This is a definite break with the efforts of traditional
cartography to measure distance & to identify boundaries, variables
that in database cartography are at best optional.
Mapping
the patchwork of the street grid as a pattern of connections enables
the cartographer to organize them in relativistic space, in the
zero-G environment of information space. Maps of public transportation
systems have been employing a certain abstraction to enable smoother
navigation for quite some time now, but in database cartography
this freedom from the territory (& the user) becomes absolute.
|