Subway Map 2.0 Beta 2008 v.1

Last year I highlighted a great map based on Tokyo's subway map which attempted to chart the interconnected-ness and relative popularity of the internet's top 200 websites. The designers, Information Architect, said an updated one would be ready in December 2007. Like most Web 2.0 things they're a bit late, but a beta one is out now:


The guys behind the design agency said "This time we've taken almost 300 of the most influential and successful websites and pinned them down to the greater Tokyo-area train map. By popular demand, we enlarged the poster size from A3 to A0."

Like all good betas they are asking for suggestions and improvements to make it better and you can even submit influential companies which you think they've left off, before they print the poster version.

Last year I predicted that twitter would be on the later version, so it's no surprise to see it there. However, I was surprised and interested to see blogs like Perez Hilton & Go Fug Yourself appearing on the end of the News Line not far behind ABC and USA Today - the influence of celebrity bloggers is strong. Even Fake Steve Jobs makes an appearance.

One of the commenters says "The folks at eBay's Toys building have an enormous (about 4′ x 8′) copy of last year's map up in their space." It certainly will make for an interesting poster and I'm looking forward to seeing it come out of beta.