Image by formforce via Flickr
The Web Trend Map is a yearly publication by Information Architects Inc. (iA).
It maps the 333 leading Web domains and the 111 most influential Internet people onto the Tokyo Metro map.
Domains are carefully selected by the iA research team in Zürich and chosen through dialogue with map enthusiasts.
Each domain is evaluated based on traffic, revenue, age and the company that owns it.
The iA design team in Tokyo assigns these selected domains to individual stations on the Tokyo Metro map in ways that complement the characters of each.
For example, Twitter is located in Shibuya this year: Shibuya is the station with the biggest buzz.
Google is placed in the busiest, most highly trafficked train station in the world: Shinjuku.
The New York Times, the »Old Gray Lady«, is located in Sugamo—a shopping paradise for Tokyo’s grandmothers.
We grouped closely-associated websites and tried to make sure each individual domain is on a metro line that suits it, with close attention paid to the intersections.
As a result, the map produces a web of associations: some provocative, some curious, others satirically accurate.
Why Tokyo Metro? Because it works beautifully.
You can evaluate a domain based on its station’s height,width and position.
Height: A station’s height represents its domain’s success. »Success« refers not only to traffic, but also revenue and trend.
Width: A station’s width represents the stability of the company behind its domain. However, not every large corporation has a large building.
Unless its domain has proven itself as a significant online component, its station remains thin.
Position: A station’s location on a metro line indicates the group it belongs to.
A station‘s position on the map—whether inside the main line, on the main line, or outside the main line—indicates whether it is a part of the tech establishment, a traffic hub, or an online suburb.
