csiquet Posted July 25, 2014 Dear AFOLs, It is my great pleasure to announce the launch of the BrickMap website. Made by AFOLs for AFOLs, BrickMap is a compendium of LEGO® related Businesses and Services websites to hopefully help you with any brick need you might have. With time we hope this site will become THE site of reference when looking for LEGO related resources. Please share and contribute. Enjoy. What is BrickMap? In early 2014, Yun Mi Antorini, the Community Strategist of Community Engagement & Events at LEGO® Systems A/S, started a volunteer project to map and better “understand the LEGO® ecosystem.” A group consisting of Rebecca Deak, Christophe Siquet, Boštjan Svetličič and Nathan Bryan were tasked to create an outline for this project. Once the framework was built 24 other LEGO® Ambassadors were asked for their input. From the wonderful input received, an original map of over 2,000 Businesses and Services spanning 62 Categories was created. Once duplicates were sorted out, 797 unique sites (1,169 when counting some sites spanning multiple Categories) remained. Probably, one of the most comprehensive maps of LEGO® resources ever created. From that map, this independent site was built to allow AFOLs (Adult Fans Of LEGO®) to suggest more sites to create an even more comprehensive map. We hope this will benefit everyone interested in finding LEGO® related information around the world. Collaborating together with you, the fans of LEGO®, we hope to create a great resource map “By AFOLs for AFOLs.” Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
-Horizon- Posted July 25, 2014 Nice website you have there. Will bookmark it for future use. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
grum64 Posted July 25, 2014 (edited) Great site. Nice to have so much information etc., available from one place. Thank you to all those involved. Edited July 25, 2014 by grum64 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Zerobricks Posted July 26, 2014 I just found this site today and I'm happy to be also included Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Superkalle Posted August 1, 2014 Interesting initiative! I have a short question: In the site it says "we" on several places, referring to the ones who operate the site. Are "we" the same four people who are mentioned in the FAQ (Rebecca Deak, Christophe Siquet, Boštjan Svetličič and Nathan Bryan)? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Meiko Posted August 1, 2014 I like the site so far. I was pleased to see they had Brickipedia's new site listed since so many people aren't aware it moved to a new domain! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Paul B Technic Posted August 1, 2014 I sent a suggestion last week to have my blog added, it is not appearing as yet, what is the time frame for this? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Cwetqo Posted August 1, 2014 Interesting initiative! I have a short question: In the site it says "we" on several places, referring to the ones who operate the site. Are "we" the same four people who are mentioned in the FAQ (Rebecca Deak, Christophe Siquet, Boštjan Svetličič and Nathan Bryan)? Being one of those four, I can say: yes! :) I'm glad that you like the site or at least the idea behind it. Design could be (and will be) worked on, but most important thing is the list itself. Maybe a few words on how it started: last year a small number of LEGO Ambassadors participated in a project for TLG's CEE team with the goal to explain how complete AFOL ecosytem works (at least roughly). Things which are logical to us, like where we get ideas, how we coopaerate with each other, where we buy stuff etc..., are hard to understand to outsiders, including management and people which approve all kinds of support which community receives. It's final result were mostly diagrams, flowcharts and other complicated stuff, but no specific sites or data. It was succesful and aggregated data found its way into TLGs yearly report, but among its final thoughts was also the idea that it could be made much better. This year TLG's strategist Yun Mi Antorini came with the idea to broaden the research and make even better study. Four of was had the task to come up with methodolgy and questions and 25 other ambassadors were chosen to participate in survey, which was quite extensive. There were two stages: first everyone needed to compile a list of as many different LEGO reaated sites as possible. We got incredible number of answers and after organising them, list was again sent to group of 25 to rate those categories and give examples of sites. FInal compiled list still had over 1200 entries and was (as excel file) not that easy to browse. When thinking abou how to represent it in most usable way, our member Nathan Bryan came up with first version of BrickMap site (which was not planned at first). We agreed to keep working togehter and keep it alive and all you are invited to contribute. Please understand that we are not professionals and some things could take time (we are still figuring out how to it in most effective way and there is also slight delay because of the holiday season) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Superkalle Posted August 2, 2014 Thanks for the clarification Cwetqo It was a bit unclear on the site itself who was behind it and managed it, so that's why I asked. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Cwetqo Posted August 2, 2014 No problem! You can read more about initial research in current issue of HispaBrick Magazine on page 92, where is interview with Yun Mi Antorini. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Adolfo Posted August 3, 2014 Excellent project! It`ll be an important tool to all AFOLs. I can imagine the challenge to keep the database updated, but everybody can help in this task too. Congratulations! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
