A map designer has posted a globe on which we find the most famous historical, political, sporting or cultural figure, born in his municipality. The number of towns and villages listed is impressive.
A good plan to kill lost hours: find the most famous people for each municipality in the world. Topi Tjukanov, geographer and designer at Mapbox, has designed an interactive map (find it here) with the most famous character, living or dead, in each city, village, on this planet. A person’s contribution to society to be considered notable can vary depending on many factors. Each name on the map was determined using a combination of information extracted from Wikipedia and Wikidata.
The determining criteria for choosing each person are:
- The length, i.e. the total number of words found in a biography.
- The average number of consultations for each individual between 2015 and 2018.
- The number of non-missing items retrieved from Wikipedia or Wikidata for date of birth, gender, and area of influence. The idea here is that the more notable the individual, the more their biographies will be documented.
- The total number of external links (sources, references, etc.) from Wikidata.
The most famous characters reappear on the map and there are a myriad of new figures by zooming in on each municipality. We (re)discover a bit of history with this initiative and we also remember that some historical, political or cultural figures were born in places that we did not suspect, such as Freddie Mercury in Zanzibar.