Strange Maps Success

Strange Maps is a blog in which Frank Jacobs comments about strange maps that he has collected over the years. According to Jacobs, "some of the maps are real, some are fiction, and some are what if maps." Either way, he has very good insight and an interesting way of dissecting different maps into the reality or fantasy of what they are or could be. Jacobs began this blog on WordPress in 2006 and now writes for Big Think, and has wrote 645 posts thus far. His most famous post is  "US States Renamed for Countries with Similar GDPs" has been viewed more than 587,000 times. There has been a book published by Penguin Books in 2009 that contains a compilation of his many blogs called, "Strange Maps, An Atlas of Cartographic Curiosities."   



Jacobs is not actually a cartographer, but has had a fascination with maps since he was a kid. Most of the maps that he posts about are old maps that were hand drawn, and he views them as more of an art form. In an interview with Jacobs on Public Radio International, he explains that a great deal of the maps that he writes about now are ones that are sent to him by viewers of his blog, which accounts to how successful his blog is and to how many people there are out there that are also fascinated with old maps.