Circulation and Use of Maps - Participatory Mapping: New Data, New Cartography - page 116

Hayakawa and understands how the Shinkansen
[the Japanese HST] runs as well as the highway
up north they would be able to understand the
government is asking you to drive thru Chernobyl
and stay a while. [ sic ] 4
In the two examples outlined above, maps were used to
support an exchange of views on the situation. In this case,
interpretations and statements by the government and the
industry were verified through the comparison among
different maps. Far from criticizing for the sake of it, the
contributors admit the possibility that alternative
measurements back official ones. Akiba claims that as well
as getting hold of Geiger counters he aims to check the
accuracy of official data, more than to reject it a priori :
As you can imagine, people in the hackerspace
and probably the tech community in general, is
skeptical of government data. We wanted
independent corroboration that the government
data was accurate. In fact, most countries and the
International Atomic Energy Agency decided to
collect their own data independent of the
government. The public should have access to
something similar. Since then, there have been
numerous geiger counters that have popped up
and the collective information seems to match the
numbers we're seeing from the government. That
allows people to have more confidence that the
government numbers are accurate and reliable.
[ sic ] 5 Akiba, Make Magazine, March 29, 2011
4 Anonymous comment, December 19, 2011, 22:00. See: http://ex-
skf.blogspot.com/2011/12/fukushima-i-nuke-plant-cold-shutdown.html.
5 See: http://makezine.com/2011/03/29/hackerspace-happenings-make-
interviews-tokyos-akiba/.