In the most recent Technology Quarterly from The Economist, 5 of NetSquared's previous Featured Projects are featured for their innovative application of mapping tools for social benefit work.

"For most people it is merely a handy tool to find a nearby pizzeria or get directions to a meeting. But mapping technology has matured into a tool for social justice. Whether it is to promote health, safety, fair politics or a cleaner environment, foundations, non-profit groups and individuals around the world are finding that maps can help them make their case far more intuitively and effectively than speeches, policy papers or press releases." - Read more.

Check out the 5 Featured Projects, in order of appearance:

• MAPLight.org: "A percentage or a table is still abstract for people," says Dan Newman of MAPLight.org, a group based in Berkeley, California that charts the links between politicians and money.
• GreenMap.org: "With maps, you can show people how an abstract concept connects to where they live." Wendy Brawer, founding director of GreenMap.org, a mapping site based in New York used by people in 54 countries, says maps can make a point even if they are in a foreign language.
  
• MoveSmart.org: Rob Breymaier of MoveSmart.org, a non-profit group that encourages people to "move to opportunity", recalls using Kirwan's maps in Chicago in 2006 to help a family of eight. "They ended up finding a place in the north-west suburbs, which is a huge change from Chicago's south side," he says. The children ended up in better schools and stayed out of trouble, he says.
• Ushahidi.com: Ushahidi.com was launched by four technologists to map citizen reports of post-election violence in Kenya last year using Google Maps. "We're building a platform that makes it easier to gather information around a crisis so that governments, or whoever is trying to hide the crisis, can't do it anymore," says Erik Hersman, Ushahidi's operations director.
• HealthyCity.org: Sequences of maps can also be used to debunk misconceptions. Many in Los Angeles were pleased, for example, to learn that gun violence had decreased since the mid-1990s. But by developing a series of maps showing where shootings continued to happen, a local non-profit group called Healthy City was able to show that for some Los Angelenos, gun violence was as bad as ever.

You can find these Featured Projects in the Global Project Gallery by clicking on the Project names below.   You can read the full Economist article online here.

• MAPLight
• GreenMap
• MoveSmart
• Ushahidi
• HealthyCity

Such examples underscore why campaigners are rushing to make the most of map technology. "We don't just want to be about mapping," says John Kim of Healthy City. "Maps don't change the world—but people who use maps do."