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Online map searches that bring you to Null Island

WSJ.com: “Every day, countless people seeking digital directions on their computers and smartphones are diverted to an isolated spot on the Atlantic Ocean, 1,000 miles or so off the coast of Africa, where the Prime Meridian and the equator intersect. It’s called Null Island. This lonely way station in the Gulf of Guinea…is…one of the most-visited places in the world. The only problem for its millions of visitors is that there isn’t much to see…In the world of geographic information systems, the island is an apparition that serves a practical purpose. It lies at “zero-zero,” a mapper’s shorthand for zero degrees latitude and zero degrees longitude. By a programming quirk introduced by developers, those are the default coordinates where Google maps and other digital Global Positioning System applications are directed to send the millions of users who make mistakes in their searches…”

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