The ALS Association, an organization that raises money for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) research, is running an Ice Bucket Challenge, in which people have others dump a bucket of ice water on them in order to raise money for the ALS Association and other charities.
Personally, I think it's an absolutely stupid idea.
The Ice Bucket Challenge is, in my opinion, more about serving the egos of rich people like Bill Gates and Vince McMahon, celebrities like Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon, and self-serving politicians like Scott Walker and Chris Christie than it is about raising money to find a cure for a neurodegenative disease that has claimed the lives of thousands of people. The ALS Foundation is drawing attention away from their own cause and drawing attention to a bunch of famous people having ice water dumped on their heads.
If someone were to challenge me to do the Ice Bucket Challenge, I wouldn't accept the challenge, I wouldn't challenge anyone else to do the challenge, and I don't have any money to donate to a charity. If the ALS Foundation or someone else wants to sue me over this, they can sue me.
August 16, 2014
July 7, 2014
Cool new USGS website compiles 130 years of U.S. topographic maps in one place
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) recently launched their new Historical Topographic Map Explorer, which allows people to view topographic maps of the United States from 1884 onward, all on a single website.
This is one of the coolest websites I've stumbled on, since you can look at what most areas of the country looked like decades ago. The Atlantic's CityLab website published this article about the USGS's new website. While the map is zoomed into New Orleans, Louisiana each time you bring up the website for reasons unknown, you can zoom the map out and pan the map around to view the entire country. To bring up the old topographical maps, either enter a location into the search feature or click somewhere on the map, and a timeline of topographical maps for the location you either typed in or clicked on will appear at the bottom of the page. Click on one of links in the timeline in order to bring up an available historical map (blue link backgrounds in the timeline are less detailed maps that usually cover a larger area, green link backgrounds in the timeline are more detailed maps that usually cover a smaller area), and it will be overlayed over a modern map of the country. If your map doesn't appear, you'll need to zoom in, pan to the map area, or both. You can also bring up multiple historical maps simultaneously, although, should multiple maps cover the same area, you'll have to reorder the maps in the left sidebar by dragging and dropping, slide the transparency slider of one or more maps (located below the download link for each map), or both to see each map.
You can see how this country's cities, communities, roads, rail lines, etc. have evolved over the past 130 years with the USGS's new Historical Topographic Map Explorer.
This is one of the coolest websites I've stumbled on, since you can look at what most areas of the country looked like decades ago. The Atlantic's CityLab website published this article about the USGS's new website. While the map is zoomed into New Orleans, Louisiana each time you bring up the website for reasons unknown, you can zoom the map out and pan the map around to view the entire country. To bring up the old topographical maps, either enter a location into the search feature or click somewhere on the map, and a timeline of topographical maps for the location you either typed in or clicked on will appear at the bottom of the page. Click on one of links in the timeline in order to bring up an available historical map (blue link backgrounds in the timeline are less detailed maps that usually cover a larger area, green link backgrounds in the timeline are more detailed maps that usually cover a smaller area), and it will be overlayed over a modern map of the country. If your map doesn't appear, you'll need to zoom in, pan to the map area, or both. You can also bring up multiple historical maps simultaneously, although, should multiple maps cover the same area, you'll have to reorder the maps in the left sidebar by dragging and dropping, slide the transparency slider of one or more maps (located below the download link for each map), or both to see each map.
You can see how this country's cities, communities, roads, rail lines, etc. have evolved over the past 130 years with the USGS's new Historical Topographic Map Explorer.
Welcome to The Apollo Diary!
I'm Aaron Camp, the author of this brand new blog. I'm a 24-year-old resident of Westville, Illinois. While I am the author of multiple political blogs, this will be my new non-political blog.
I'll write about a number of different subjects that I'm interested in on here. Check back often for the latest blog posts!
I'll write about a number of different subjects that I'm interested in on here. Check back often for the latest blog posts!
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