Happy new financial year, everyone!

Big Think have a great post on the propensity of humans to see faces (or other meaning ) in objects – with particular regard to cartography, including an algorithm that trawls Google Maps, to return features that look like faces. Very, very cool.

George Percivall from the OGC has posted a piece entitled ‘Cartographers of the Future’, which – as you may have guessed – charts the future of cartography, as well as the recent important advances that are shaping it.

CNET has featured a map that places famous literature into a real world context, allowing you to see the actual locations where some of your favourite novels have taken place.

Google Maps Mania has some great maps this week, including this fascinating visualisation of Tweets in San Francisco, New York, and Istanbul;

this hilarious twist on the use of Foursquare data where a map is generated showing your friend’s locations, not so you can find them, but so you can avoid them. It also suggests good places to hang out where the odds of running in to them are minimised;

And this page, showing off 3D, animated Open Street Map world map, as well as an interesting visualisation of flight patterns.

Finally, Cameron Shorter has posted a follow-up to the recent GeoServices REST API controversy with the OGC, including information on the OGC’s recent decision to redefine itself.