this post was submitted on 04 Sep 2026
780 points (98.8% liked)
Mildly Interesting
27885 readers
383 users here now
This is for strictly mildly interesting material. If it's too interesting, it doesn't belong. If it's not interesting, it doesn't belong.
This is obviously an objective criteria, so the mods are always right. Or maybe mildly right? Ahh.. what do we know?
Just post some stuff and don't spam.
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Do you really think that the distortion over the short distance shown while navigating matters? I don't know many drivers that actually use their geometry kit when using a navigation app.
People use digital maps for all kinds of purposes, not just navigating while driving.
For example I often look at digital maps as a pedestrian in order to know which direction to walk (even without actually entering navigation mode), or in order to find out where places of interest are around me, and there it definitely helps that the angles are the same in reality as on the map.
How many different directions can you go in where the skewing of angles would cause you confusion?
I didn't know you live so close to the arctic that you can't identify the direction you need to go when looking at a paper map.
With navigation software that simply uses your current position for the center of the projection all corners stay so close to reality that i dare you to see the difference (we are not living on a globe the size of a tangerine). There's also the hint you get from the small arrow pointing out the direction you are currently facing.
I'm fairly sure the software care a great deal about projections and which chart datum is used. Just because it's abstracted and invisible for the user I'm fairly sure you would notice if google maps stopped accepting wgs-84 positions or if they changed into an inverted projection. So yes it matters a great deal even on local levels.