Comments on: Here There Be Anthropomorphic Dragons

Here There Be Anthropomorphic Dragons

ShawnString — Wed, 02 May 2007 06:41:37 -0800

What if all the online communities were drawn on a map? Here's what it might look like. I guess we are off the world's end though.

By: ShawnString

ShawnString — Wed, 02 May 2007 06:41:59 -0800

and sorry about the one link post. I just thought it was a cool map.

By: cgc373

cgc373 — Wed, 02 May 2007 06:48:30 -0800

It is a cool map, but I fear these xkcd links are going the way of the Get Your War On! links of yore, ShawnString.

By: notmydesk

notmydesk — Wed, 02 May 2007 06:58:09 -0800

No Counter-Strike? Aw.

By: googly

googly — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:01:31 -0800

You see that little island that appears to be a minor outlier of technorati and boingboing? That's us. The Guam of the Blogipeligo.

By: darkripper

darkripper — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:05:01 -0800

I can see the flaming eye of the Dark Lord of Yahoo in the north, watching us, searching for the one ring 2.0.

By: cortex

cortex — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:06:05 -0800

Related material!

By: drezdn

drezdn — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:10:41 -0800

I | xkcd.

By: Plutor

Plutor — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:15:26 -0800

We're not "off the world's end", we're just too small to be worth noticing. Boingboing's reach is apparently about twice ours according to Alexa, so we must be one of the lesser islands in the Blogipeligo in the south-western corner. Let's claim the island just north of the letter "I".

By: muddgirl

muddgirl — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:18:42 -0800

I like xkcd as much as the next person, but are we going to post about it every time he mentions the blawg-o-web?

By: iconomy

iconomy — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:21:15 -0800

There's nothing wrong with one link posts and I wish everyone would stop apologizing for them. I'd rather have a single link to one good thing (not that this post is necessarily that one good thing... ) than be clubbed over the head with 30 links that I'm never going to click on. [/message board goon]

By: josher71

josher71 — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:24:16 -0800

Isn't this also the map of the Hyborean world, i.e. Conan's lands?

By: graymouser

graymouser — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:36:37 -0800

josher: Nope. The Hyborean world looks more or less like this.

By: desjardins

desjardins — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:44:00 -0800

I love me some maps.

By: Terminal Verbosity

Terminal Verbosity — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:44:47 -0800

I vacationed in the Sea of Memes a while ago with the Star Wars Kid and Chuck Norris. I almost left when the dancing baby goatsed me, but the last straw was that damn cat watching me mastrubate.

By: Terminal Verbosity

Terminal Verbosity — Wed, 02 May 2007 07:50:17 -0800

Also, xkcd's previous map of the internet.

By: fluffycreature

fluffycreature — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:03:06 -0800

Discover Magazine takes a crack at the blogosphere....

By: 13twelve

13twelve — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:24:27 -0800

No Counter-Strike? Aw. notmydesk - this is what I thought! According to Wikipedia, Steam regulary shows over 200,000 players. The actual number of people with Counterstrike installed has to be near 1,000,000. I'm a geek who thought he had a home in the world of Counterstike who is now finding I have no home at all. I'll be buggered if I start plaing WoW... (ok now wheres the line rider community? and the tower defense community?)

By: drezdn

drezdn — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:35:08 -0800

From The Discover article..The brightest light belongs to syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin. That is a sentence I thought I would never see.

By: Samizdata

Samizdata — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:38:36 -0800

So we're anthropomorphic dragons? I always knew I was different...

By: Bugbread

Bugbread — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:39:54 -0800

ShawnString: There's nothing wrong with single link posts. The rule that gets misinterpreted that way is the rule against "single link op/ed" posts. So if your link is an opinion/editorial, single-link is no good. If it isn't, then what single-linkness is fine, and the quality of that single link is all that matters.

By: josher71

josher71 — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:42:39 -0800

I'm so embarassed.

By: Milkman Dan

Milkman Dan — Wed, 02 May 2007 08:55:38 -0800

This is a brilliant concept. Great job on making the memes liquid: floating around, becoming evaporated, raining down over the whole world, getting integrated into the Sea of Culture. Casting the auto-communities as the Icy North is cute. It's cold up in the North. All those scarves, toques, jackets and bellaclava's tend to obscure one's facial features, which is why Yahoo! and AOL always end up appearing like faceless corporations. I would have liked to see cross-internet things like del.icio.us and stumbleupon be some kind of "Panama Canal" type thing, or maybe an overhead weather pattern. I love how close "The Lonely Island" is to E-harmony and all those other dating services. The mainland is accesible only by careful sailing, or desperate swimming. (Also, LOL-but-only-kinda, right next to the straits of Web 2.0 are the "gays" of Web 2.0.) I was going to ask where the pornography was, but then I noticed the entire map was the colour of flesh.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:00:51 -0800

MeTa. Sorry, I missed this post Shawn

By: YoBananaBoy

YoBananaBoy — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:13:31 -0800

I loved "Stallman's Airship". That cracked me up.

By: pica

pica — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:17:42 -0800

Technically speaking it's not really a single link post, is it?

By: jason's_planet

jason's_planet — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:17:51 -0800

I guess we are off the world's end though. Good. I like it that way.

By: octothorpe

octothorpe — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:21:42 -0800

I loved "Stallman's Airship". That cracked me up. And Cory Doctorow's balloon.

By: petsounds

petsounds — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:33:20 -0800

god i hate you nerds.

By: Ber

Ber — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:39:47 -0800

Thanks for that map Graymouser; it's been a long time since I've walked those lands. Though I thought given your name you'd have also posted this.

By: robocop is bleeding

robocop is bleeding — Wed, 02 May 2007 09:45:33 -0800

Log: Day 1 Today, I sail forth towards my destiny. I have been studying the mysterious "MeFisles" for the past several years. Not shown on any map, this strange land of blues and greens has existed only in legend, in the tales of sailors, and in the half-mad rantings of the banned. The stories describe it as a magical place, a sort of enlightened dictatorship run by an enigmatic wizard, where its denizens work tirelessly milling the very stuff Online Communita is made of. They call this practice "filtering," but many call it a hoax. But no longer. You see, I have found it. Or at least, by sifting through the legends, I have discovered how to get there. And go there, I shall! Ban the expense! My lj-friends and contacts call me mad for spending this much time and effort, but we'll see who's laughing in the end! I have hired a ship, the Hope Me, to take me on my voyage. She is not the stoutest of vessels, but she is fast and trim. Her crew is from all over the world, sailors blown here and there by the ever changing web-winds. Some have even heard the tales of the MeFisles! Log: Day 3 Oh, how the Sea of Noobs pulses and throbs! It is like a living thing. I have yet to grow homesick for my old town of Geocities, nestled at the foot of the Web 1.0 Mountains, but I expect I shall in time. Everything is strange at sea. The crew have their own customs, even their own language! It is so much to take in. Log: Day 4 The crew began singing as the reefed the sails up at sunset. Here is their song: It's a long way to World of Warcraft! It's a long way to go. It's a long way to World of Warcraft! To the sweetest loot I know! Goodbye City of Heroes! Farewell EverQuest! It's a long way to World of Warcraft But my alt's right there! Stunning. Even Captain Moddy, normally a grizzled old salt of few words and fewer manners, began to sing. Log: Day 6 Disaster! As our ship rounded the Cape of MySpace Bands, we were attacked! The crew tells me it was Identity Pirates. When we first saw their vessel, I thought it nothing more than a simple banking site, or maybe some sort of online check cashing service. I asked the Captain if he would mind coming around to meet it as I had to transfer some monies into my account and wanted to be sure I complied with my bank's safety regulations. The Captain looked at me as if I had three heads before shaking his own and sighing, "Ye really be from the North, lad. Thar is no banking site!" Before I could reply, a shot echoed across our bow. My ears are still ringing from that horrible cry: "You are the 1000th Visitor!! Click here to claim your ppprrrriiiiizzzeeee!!!" The Captain sent me below decks. I hid as above me the noise of battle shook the ship to its very timbers. I grew sick with fear, the rusty cutlass I found clutched tightly to my chest. The battle raged for hours before the Captain came down to fetch me. "Light butcher's bill this eve," he drawled, packing a pipe, "We were lucky. Still, we're going to need to cross the Gulf of YouTube. We need supplies and after a fight like that, I likes to give the men a bit o'leave. Attractive MySpace peninsula shan't be but a few days away." Then he noticed that I had soiled myself and spat before going back up above deck. I do not like the sea much anymore. ------ Please feel free to continue the tale!

By: Navelgazer

Navelgazer — Wed, 02 May 2007 10:00:27 -0800

I saw this this morning, and loved it, assuming that we were just a tiny island in the blogapeligo, but given the bearings of real life-v-web, I think we might be a little further east than that. Also, I appologize for deluding us all with xkcd links a few months back. But not really, as it is my favorite web-comic, so whatever.

By: quin

quin — Wed, 02 May 2007 10:03:11 -0800

I've got a nice little place on the compass-rose-shaped island. It's a pleasant little villa, nothing too ostentatious; about 20,000 square feet with a great view of the Cliffs of Lol. I use it as a holiday retreat when I'm not committing acts of piracy in the Bay of Angst.

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Wed, 02 May 2007 10:07:49 -0800

Totally love this! Thanks. Also loved the ancient cartoon by Saul Steinberg, View of the World From 9th Avenue 1976.

By: Navelgazer

Navelgazer — Wed, 02 May 2007 10:08:35 -0800

deluding - deluging. Big difference.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 02 May 2007 10:44:00 -0800

Yeah, nickyskye, I love that cartoon. It saw some renewed exposure a while ago with the New Yorkistan thing.

By: straight

straight — Wed, 02 May 2007 11:08:26 -0800

"Too many xkcd links" is a nonsense phrase.

By: damn dirty ape

damn dirty ape — Wed, 02 May 2007 11:40:10 -0800

Boingboing is in the web-intellectual area? Err,sorry. Its a nice little soapbox for Cory and some random "zine-ish" items tossed it, but I wouldnt exactly say intellectual. Its like fark for the art school set, not for the phd set. If BB is what passed for intellectualism on the net, then we have bigger problems than one-link posts. It really belongs in the geek-subculture area closer to Wired/Lifehacker and farther from sourceforge/slashdot.

By: damn dirty ape

damn dirty ape — Wed, 02 May 2007 11:45:47 -0800

That said, I love this map and am always in awe and jealousy when I see anything from xkcd (which sounds like a lightweight linux windows manager to me).

By: moonbiter

moonbiter — Wed, 02 May 2007 12:27:17 -0800

Hmm. If Nehwon and the Hyborean world get shout outs, then Earthsea does too. Sadly, the map of my own home leaves something to be desired.

By: hydatius

hydatius — Wed, 02 May 2007 12:47:07 -0800

Yeah, nickyskye, I love that cartoon. It saw some renewed exposure a while ago with the New Yorkistan thing. God, I love that cartoon. It was the first thing I thought of when I saw the xkcd cartoon. My old girlfriend used to have it printed on her damn shower curtain, of all things. And every single time I was in there, I would find a new thing to make me laugh.

By: Lynsey

Lynsey — Wed, 02 May 2007 14:28:25 -0800

I don't know where we are on that map, but I guess we could walk there.

By: Sticherbeast

Sticherbeast — Wed, 02 May 2007 15:23:43 -0800

4chan is nearer to the furries than to SPARTAAA? Blasphemy.

By: HTuttle

HTuttle — Wed, 02 May 2007 20:14:37 -0800

Not this old shit again.

By: Many bubbles

Many bubbles — Wed, 02 May 2007 21:21:28 -0800

4chan is nearer to the furries than to SPARTAAA? Blasphemy. Eh, 4chan's a bunch of closet furries. On any given day there's a good chance of there being a "discussion" there about whether catgirls/harpies/whatever count as furry, and reassurances that no, of course they do not. It's almost as prevalent as "I like futa, does that make me gay?"

By: grapefruitmoon

grapefruitmoon — Thu, 03 May 2007 00:04:20 -0800

It took some squinting to see it, but it was totally worth it - "The Shipwreck of the SS Howard Dean" is totally my favorite part of the map. Totally. (Clearly, I just flew in from the MySpace peninsula. I'm still web-lagged.)