ASCII What?!?! Maps? Yeah, right.

I'm sure you've almost certainly heard of google maps, and the cool stuff they're doing using AJAX on the client side. And I agree, it's neat. But I stumbled across something today which absolutely blew my mind.

I haven't seen everything that technology can do, but I have seen some really cool innovative stuff - and let me just tell you...what I saw today is the most bizarre, geeky thing I've ever seen: What is this peculiar modern marvel? ASCII Maps.

Let it sink in. ASCII - as in dashes, hashes and chain emails from the early 90's. And Maps - as in what you use to get directions. Yep, someone decided the world needed to view maps in ASCII.

While the geek part of me (yes, it's the most dominant part) revels in the sheer enormity of planning and programming that had to take place to achieve this, the last 1% or so of me (which usually deals with a combination of rational thought and pity) wonders why anyone would WANT to do such a thing.

Ah, well. I think it's fairly amusing, and pretty amazing. I just wonder what would have happened if all that planning were put into something more productive. Could they have put a stop to world hunger, or possibly established global peace? Maybe. Maybe.