Truly amazing from a Geographic stand point as well as coming from the type of background I work in - Geospatial Information/Data. Enter Wikipedia, we all know it, we all probably one time or another have even used it, but what is GeoHack? Still fresh here and to put it mildly, I'm not yet positive on what exactly it is; but can interpolate that it is a very powerful tool if you think like I do. Put simply, it is easier to instruct you with this basic tutorial of sorts on how to use it rather than explain what it is; I'll do my best here - GeoHack is a culmination of geographic information that has been organized in a "One-Stop Shop" for users to access. For example, head over to
Wikipedia and type a known location; in the graphic above, I used Port Sulphur, LA. Once at the result page for Port Sulphur, LA you will see a coordinates link at the top right-hand side of the page; click on the actual
Lat/Long coordinate link. This link will redirect you to Wiki's GeoHack page; once here you will see an organized list with links to everything possibly related to this geographic location distributed from many Federal, State, Local, & Private entities, etc. Fore fun, click on the "Satellite" link from "GeoNames" listed under Global Services section as seen below:
Do you see some potential in this tool? Can you imagine what this can be used for? For many Geospatial related industries... hell, even Planners, Engineers, the list goes on and on - this culmination/wealth of Geo- information/data that Wikipedia has organized and made available to the general public, truly is a work of art. Plug in some cool cities/towns from anywhere on Earth and have fun with Wikipedia's GeoHack and all it has to offer!
