CityMaps is a social mapping website that has come up with a clever and easier way to explore your neighbourhood (that is if you live in NY, San Francisco or Austin for the moment) making the search of different criteria (eating, shopping, entertainment, among others) more intuitive and purely visual. This is how Logo Maps works, instead of filling the urban map with type they chose to put every respective logo in its place, making it easier for users to recognize what their looking for. It definitely makes things easier for people searching for specific stuff, let's say you can search for coffee shops around your area or maybe shopping, it's all in there and you can find your preferred brand just by seeing their logo. Their search options are by category (let's say food or shopping survey for example) and by area. (Can you spot how many Starbucks are there in NYC? 15 where I counted!) Definitely a great idea that hopefully will spread to other cities. The design and interface of the website is also very clean cut and easy to navigate, fundamental requisites for a perfectly readable map. Give it a try, it's a fun experiment! They also offer offline surveys, which can be a great way to gather feedback even when you’re not connected to the internet.
