Prosecuting Crimes Against Humanity

The Universal Jurisdiction Interactive Map (UJIM), developed by TRIAL International, is a comprehensive and accessible digital tool designed to track and display criminal cases related to serious international crimes such as genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, torture, enforced disappearances, and the crime of aggression.

Universal Jurisdiction is a legal principle that allows states to prosecute individuals for such crimes, regardless of where the crime occurred or the nationality of the perpetrators or victims. High-profile cases -such as the arrest of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet - have demonstrated both its potential and its controversy, triggering legislative pushbacks in countries like Spain and Belgium. Nevertheless, there has been a steady global rise in trials based on universal jurisdiction, reflecting a growing commitment to international accountability.

The map reveals that European countries have carried out by far the most prosecutions under Universal Jurisdiction, with Germany and France leading the way. According to the map’s About page, “Germany has the highest number of convictions for international crimes,” while “France has opened the most investigations on economic actors.”

The UJIM catalogs cases from 196 countries and is updated annually.

800K Galaxies - 1 Map

The newly unveiled COSMOS-Web is the largest, most detailed map of the universe ever created. The map plots nearly 800,000 galaxies, and almost spans the entire 13.8-billion-year history of the cosmos.

The map is the result of a multinational collaboration led by astrophysicists at UC Santa Barbara and the Rochester Institute of Technology - using data collected by the James Webb Space Telescope. The telescope’s powerful infrared capabilities allowed researchers to peer deeper into space - and further back in time - than ever before, capturing galaxies from just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. 

The interactive COSMOS-Web viewer offers a groundbreaking way to explore data from the James Webb Space Telescope firsthand. Users can pan and zoom across deep space, tracing the structure of the universe and inspecting individual galaxies. While the map answers some long-standing questions, it also raises profound new ones, challenging current models of cosmic evolution and opening the door to discoveries about dark matter, galaxy formation, and the very origins of light. By making this enormous dataset publicly accessible, the COSMOS team aims to empower astronomers around the world - from seasoned researchers to students - to investigate the early universe in new ways.

You can also explore the universe interactively using:  

• ESA Star Mapper - an interactive map visualizing 59,921 stars from the Hipparcos Catalogue
• Hubble Skymap - NASA's interactive Hubble-eye view of observable galaxies, stars, and nebulae

Discover the Toxin Polluters Near You

ToxOnline is an interactive map that allows you to see which facilities are releasing toxins in your area. Simply enter your address into the map to instantly discover where and how toxic chemicals are being released near your home.

The map displays markers for all facilities reporting toxic releases and includes a heat map showing the average toxic release in the searched area. By clicking on a facility marker, you can view its name, a list of released chemicals, and the average release (in pounds). After selecting a marker, you can click on the Facility menu option to view a graph of the facility’s average yearly releases, details about the primary release method, and a chemical checklist.

ToxOnline draws from a decade’s worth of EPA-reported data (2013–2023) for most views, and the most recent 2023 data for national-level statistics. This data comes from the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), a nationwide program that tracks the management and release of certain toxic chemicals by industrial facilities. The TRI includes chemicals known to have serious health or environmental effects, such as causing cancer, respiratory issues, or harming ecosystems.

The Real-Time 15 City Map

The concept of the '15 Minute City' aims to make urban living more livable and sustainable by ensuring that all essential individual needs can be met without reliance on a car or public transport. It's a very simple idea: ideally, an individual's essential needs should be accessible within a short travel distance.

Such a simple concept deserves a suitably simple-to-understand map. CThood Athens is precisely that - a map that both brings the 15 Minute City concept to life and visualizes which areas of Athens come closest to meeting its requirements.

At its core, CThood Athens uses open-source data and tools to illustrate how far you can walk from any given point in the city (within 5 or 15 minutes) and what types of essential destinations lie within that reach. As you hover over the map, it automatically and dynamically shows you how far you can walk in 15 minutes (or 5). Clicking on a location reveals how many amenities are accessible in that time. Further, clicking the 'Show Other' button breaks down these amenities into categories (e.g., the number of green spaces, supermarkets, pharmacies, etc.).

The interactivity of CThood is both engaging and informative. Users can toggle layers, filter by place type, and customize accessibility criteria. The inclusion of statistical indicators like the Gini Index and Lorenz Curve adds analytical depth, transforming the map into a dynamic research and planning tool.

CThood is a great example of how open data and thoughtful design can be combined to support more equitable, walkable cities. I assume the intention is to apply the same methodology to other cities and create interactive 15 Minute City maps for additional locations.

You can also find 15 Minute City visualizations for a number of other cities using the Maps Mania 15minutecity tag.

Via: quantum of sollazzo

Like Google My Maps but Better

Tasmap is a powerful platform that allows anyone to create personalized, interactive maps - like Google My Maps, but better!

To help you build your own custom maps, Tasmap includes built-in AI support. This means you can get started quickly by simply telling Tasmap what you want to include on your map.

For example, I gave Tasmap the following prompt:

Help me create a map of filming locations in Los Angeles, marking the locations of famous movie scenes and nearby places worth visiting.

In response, Tasmap generated LA on Location: A Cinematic Journey - an interactive map featuring around 40 locations used in famous films. 

The map includes an impressive sidebar article that introduces the locations in themed paragraphs. For example the concluding paragraph highlights several restaurants and eateries featured in movies (including Pat & Lorraine’s Coffee Shop in Eagle Rock, where the crew from Reservoir Dogs had their pre-heist breakfast).

One major flaw with Tasmap, however, is the lack of marker content. When you click on a marker, a small information window appears with options to open the location in Google Maps or get directions. But, bafflingly, there’s no contextual information about why the marker is there. For example: “Pat & Lorraine’s Coffee Shop – this is where the crew from Reservoir Dogs had their pre-heist breakfast.” That kind of detail is completely absent.

This omission also seems to persist in the Tasmap editor. While the editor allows you to add markers to your map, it doesn’t appear to offer a way to attach any descriptive content to them. So although it's easy to add markers, there’s no way to indicate what each one represents. At the very least, markers should have a title (which could appear on hover), but ideally, users should be able to click on a marker to open a window containing user-generated content.

This niggle aside, Tasmap is an impressive and thoughtfully designed platform for creating personalized, interactive maps. Its standout feature - built-in AI support - makes the process accessible to everyone, even those with no prior experience in mapping or design. With just a simple prompt, users can generate richly themed maps that are both visually appealing and easy to share.

EthnoGuessr

EthnoGuessr is a geography-based guessing game inspired by GeoGuessr, but instead of identifying real-world locations from street views, players are shown composite facial images representing average features of various ethnic groups. 

The facial averages (sourced from anthropological website Human Phenotypes) serve as clues. Players must guess the historical geographic origin of the ethnic group by selecting a location on a world map. After each guess, the game reveals the group's name, origin, and educational background, awarding points based on the accuracy of the guess. A new set of 10 ethnic groups is presented daily.

Handled insensitively, EthnoGuessr could raise concerns. Reducing complex, diverse populations to visual averages might unintentionally promote stereotyping. However, the game aims to counterbalance this by providing detailed context - including history, migration patterns, and cultural information - turning each guess into a learning opportunity.

By blending anthropology, genetics, and geography, EthnoGuessr encourages players to explore human diversity in a structured way. Still, those uncomfortable with a game based on ethnicity might prefer DoggoGuessr, a more lighthearted alternative where players identify the geographical origins of randomized dog breeds.

Is this the future of Street View?

Odyssey has released a demo of its new AI technology that enables users to explore 3D video environments in real time.

Odyssey is similar to Google Maps Street View in that it allows users to visually explore real-world environments. However, instead of navigating through static 360-degree photos, Odyssey uses AI-generated streaming video that responds dynamically to user input.

The result is a much more interactive and immersive 3D world - like stepping into a living, evolving version of Street View, where the environment can change and unfold as you move, almost like a video game. Unlike Street View, which relies on stitched-together images, Odyssey’s model generates new video frames on the fly, simulating realistic motion and spatial consistency in response to user movements.

The Odyssey Interactive Video demo includes a number of 360-degree scenes that you can freely explore. Most reviews I've read emphasize its potential for creating 3D worlds for games. However, I think there’s also clear potential for this technology to enhance mapping, for example as an advanced Street View layer. Currently, the interactive 3D environments produced by Odyssey are fairly low in resolution, though generally clear. It would be interesting to see whether the technology could generate higher-resolution models if it were trained on Google Street View imagery.

Via: Webcurios

Mapping A Billion Birds

The ADS-B Massive Visualizer now maps 1.5 billion eBird observations. This powerful, interactive geospatial tool shows where and when different bird species have been observed by eBird users around the world.

At first glance, the map may look like just a collection of dots - but click the selector button (the square with an arrow in the bottom left corner), and you can draw a region to explore in more detail. A sidebar will appear, listing all the bird species recorded in the selected area. For example, around my own neighborhood, the map reveals sightings of the Common Wood Pigeon, European Robin, Rock Pigeon, Eurasian Blackbird, Great Tit, House Sparrow, Eurasian Blue Tit, and Black-headed Gull (though oddly, no Parakeets or Magpies).

The map also supports filtering results using ClickHouse SQL, a dialect of SQL designed specifically for the ClickHouse database. It can be a little tricky to use, but I was able to run a few queries by selecting some of the provided examples and simply replacing the 'vernacularname' with the common name of the bird species I wanted to visualize.

The ADS-B Massive Visualizer also allows you to explore a number of other large databases. These include Planes (130 billion records), Places (from Foursquare), and Photos (seemingly sourced from Flickr).

Mapping Whale Superhighways

The WWF has launched a new interactive map Blue Corridors that brings 30 years of whale migration data to life. Using the map you can:

🛰️ See where whales travel.

⚠️ Learn what’s putting them at risk.

💙 Discover how we can protect them.

The new Blue Corridors interactive map is designed to support global whale conservation efforts by visualizing decades of scientific data in a way that is accessible, actionable, and urgently relevant. At its core, the map transforms over 30 years of satellite tracking and research into a compelling, interactive experience that allows you to explore whale migration routes, pinpoint major threats, and examine conservation priorities across ocean basins. 

The map is built on 1,429 satellite tracks and over 3.2 million kilometers of migratory data and integrates inputs from more than 50 different research institutions. The platform overlays whale movements with human activities such as shipping, fishing, and pollution to identify high-risk zones, supporting data-driven decisions to mitigate threats like ship strikes and entanglements.

You can interact with the map by species, threats, or regions. The sidebar menu also includes links to news and stories about whale conservation, whale migratory routes and the threats to marine environments.

Canadian Wildfire Smoke Forecasts

The wildfires currently raging in Canada have forced the evacuation of over 25,000 people across Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. Manitoba has been the hardest hit, with entire communities like Flin Flon and Cranberry Portage forced to flee. The smoke from the wildfires is now affecting air quality not just in Canada, but in several U.S. states.

You can use Smoke Forecast to view BlueSky Canada smoke forecasts on an interactive map. These forecasts are produced by the Weather Forecast Research Team at the University of British Columbia, with support from multiple agencies. Utilizing information on fire locations, sizes, and atmospheric conditions, the map shows areas likely to be affected by wildfire smoke and estimates associated smoke concentrations.

Using the map, you can view hourly, daily average, and daily maximum ground-level PM2.5 concentrations - the fine particulate matter that poses significant health risks, especially to vulnerable populations. These forecasts can help individuals and public health agencies prepare for and respond to poor air quality conditions by providing timely, localized data. 

The Canadian Wildland Fire Information System's Interactive Map shows the current danger levels across Canada. The map also allows you to view the current estimated fire perimeters in near-real time and the locations of active fires.

Poland's Political Partition Persists

Here are two maps of Poland. The map on the left shows the partitioned Poland of 1815–1918 (from Lessons from the Partitions of Poland). The map on the right is Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza's interactive map of this week's 2025 Polish Election.

It has long been a tradition, after every Polish election, for observers to note that current voting patterns in the country still seem to follow the country's old imperial borders. Back in 2013, Irena Grosfeld and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya wrote that the spatial pattern of the 2007 Polish election was “determined, to a large extent, by the Partitions of Poland (1772–1918).” In The Past in the Polish Present, the two professors argue that the very different economic and social policies pursued by Russia, Prussia, and Austria during their control of Polish territories for over a century have left a persistent legacy. This legacy once again appears to have been evident in this week’s Polish election.

In Do Poland’s 19th-century partitions still influence elections today?, Katarzyna Skiba takes a closer look at this apparent connection between modern Polish political beliefs and “the ongoing legacies of empire.” Her examination of Polish politics includes several critiques of what some consider an overly simplistic comparison.

Via: Datawrapper's Data Viz Dispatch

Hunger Maps

The Hunger Map by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations is a visual tool that illustrates the prevalence of undernourishment across the world. It visualizes the geographic distribution of hunger and helps monitor global food insecurity trends.

Hunger Map allows users to explore data across multiple geographic scales, including countries, subregions, and regions, providing a comprehensive view of where hunger is most prevalent and how it varies across different parts of the world. The Hunger Map also includes two main views 'Undernourishment' and 'Food Insecurity', and a timeline. The map’s timeline is set to a three-year average, which helps smooth out annual fluctuations and provide a more stable picture of food insecurity. This approach is particularly useful for assessing long-term trends and guiding policy decisions based on sustained patterns rather than temporary spikes or declines.

The World Food Programme's (WFP) HungerMap Live is a real-time, interactive visualization of hunger and food insecurity across 94 countries. At its core, the map highlights the prevalence of insufficient food consumption, using a color-coded system where red indicates areas of severe hunger and green shows relatively food-secure regions. 

The WFP map also shows levels of acute and chronic malnutrition, and the risk of inadequate micronutrient intake, offering a multidimensional view of food security. Beyond food consumption data, the map integrates key drivers and contextual factors such as conflict, climate hazards, and economic indicators like inflation, exchange rates, and trade balances. 

In regions where direct data collection is limited, WFP uses machine learning models trained on historic and environmental data to generate predictive estimates of food security. These estimates are updated frequently using inputs like rainfall, vegetation levels, and market conditions. This combination of actual and predicted data enables a dynamic, detailed understanding of hunger trends, helping humanitarian organizations and governments make more timely and informed decisions to respond to crises.

The Start of Hurricane Season

Hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean officially begins on June 1 and ends on November 30 each year. The peak of hurricane activity typically occurs from mid-August to late October, with September 10 often cited as the statistical peak of the season. During this time, meteorologists and emergency planners closely monitor tropical systems and prepare for potential impacts to the U.S., Central America, the Caribbean, and parts of Canada.

To coincide with the start of the 2025 hurricane season, 157mph.com has released a new series of annual and decade-based hurricane maps. The Season Data maps allow users to view all hurricane tracks for each year since 2000, while the Decade maps provide historical context with storm data going back to the 1850s. For example, the animated GIF at the top of this post cycles through the hurricane tracks from each year in the 1990s.

On the yearly maps, users can explore all hurricane tracks for a specific year, with the ability to filter by storm type (hurricanes, tropical storms, or tropical depressions), landfall status, or individual storm name. Each track includes circular timestamps that can be clicked to reveal wind speed and atmospheric pressure at that specific point. These circles are color-coded to indicate the storm category at each timestamp.

You can discover how many hurricanes have passed near your home over the decades using StarNews’s Hurricanes that passed near me map. Simply enter your address to view the tracks of all hurricanes and tropical storms that have occurred near your location since the mid-19th century.

NOAA’s Historical Hurricane Tracks map also provides access to global hurricane data dating back as far as 1842. Using this interactive tool, you can search and visualize hurricane tracks by storm name, location, or date. For example, entering a storm like Hurricane Sandy (2012) displays its full track on the map. Data points along the track allow you to explore daily details such as wind speed and atmospheric pressure.

NOAA’s database includes records for more than 13,000 storms.