America’s Saddest Cities

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Men’s Health magazine has published a ranked list to help readers find the cities where Americans are the saddest and where they are living with big smiles on their faces. As they note, “we aren’t shrinks, so our diagnosis is more statistical than psychological.” Editors calculated suicide rates (CDC) and unemployment rates (Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of June 2011). Then they tapped SimplyMap for the percentage of households that use antidepressants as well as the number of people who report feeling the blues all or most of the time.

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View the complete list of Saddest Cities

Understandably, some of the people in those sad cities had something to say about these findings:

America’s Saddest Cities – Huffington Post

Magazine says Cincinnati is 16th saddest city

Detroit America’s Second Saddest City

Louisville is sad—we’re in Men’s Health’s top five saddest cities

Poll: Is Brandon a Sad-City Bright Spot?

Men’s Health: Honolulu best place to be happy

Magazine says St. Petersburg is country’s saddest city; Tampa not far behind

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Visit the GRI Booth at ALA Midwinter

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We will be exhibiting at the American Library Association Midwinter Meeting & Exhibition in Dallas this January. Visit us at booth 2513 for a demonstration and to have all your SimplyMap questions answered. We will also be raffling off a new computer monitor – will you be our next winner?


Midwinter Meeting & Exhibition
January 20-24, 2012
Dallas Convention Center
Dallas, TX

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Geographic Research Booth # 2513

Exhibit Hours:
Friday, January 20 — 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Saturday, January 21 — 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Sunday, January 22 — 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Monday, January 23 — 9:00 am – 2:00 pm

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Men’s Health uses SimplyMap to Rank Most Educated Cities

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Men’s Health magazine has once again published rankings that include research from SimplyMap. They ranked the most (and least) educated cities in America. In addition to several other sources of data, Men’s Health editors tapped SimplyMap to find out how many households have student loans or take adult-education courses. Hint: the folks in Plano, TX were quite a bit happier than those in Providence, RI!

Also ranked are the 50 most radioactive cities in America. Researchers used SimplyMap in this case to analyze people’s exposure to x-rays. That data, plus several other data points collected from various sources led editors to declare Jacksonville, FL as America’s most radioactive city.

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GRI Exhibiting and Presenting at North Carolina Library Association, October 4-7

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Geographic Research will be exhibiting and presenting during a vendor showcase session at the upcoming North Carolina Library Association (NCLA) Biennial Conference, October 4-7, 2011 in Hickory, NC.

Attendees can visit the SimplyMap booth or attend our vendor showcase to learn about some of the powerful new features included with SimplyMap 2.0, including:

* Completely redesigned, intuitive and simplified multi-tab interface

* Interactive guided wizards for maps and reports

* Boolean searching to quickly find data variables

* Organize your work using tags

* Easily share your work with any SimplyMap user in the country

* Powerful data filters can now be applied to both maps and reports

* More export options

* Faster performance

NCLA More Information

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GRI Exhibiting at SLA and ALA conferences this month

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We will be exhibiting at the Special Library Association Annual Conference in Philadelphia and the American Library Association conference in New Orleans later this month. Come and visit the Geographic Research booth, enter to win a new computer monitor, and get a first look at recently-released SimplyMap 2.0, redesigned from the ground up!

2011 SLA Annual Conference and INFO-EXPO
Pennsylvania Convention Center
Philadelphia, PA

Geographic Research Booth # 816

Exhibit Hours:
Sunday, June 12 | 12:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Monday, June 13 | 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Tuesday, June 14 | 10:00 a.m. – 5:30 p.m.

2011 ALA Annual Conference and Exhibition
Ernest N. Morial Convention Center
New Orleans, LA

Geographic Research Booth #3621

Exhibit Hours:
Friday, June 24: 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
Saturday, June 25: 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Sunday, June 26: 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Monday, June 27: 9:00 am – 2:00 pm

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Adventures in Marketing Research: NYPL

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Kenneth Johnson of the  Science, Industry, and Business Library at the New York Public Library recently provided a “boot camp” on the library’s market research resources to budding entrepreneurs participating in FastTrac® NewVenture™.  After several weeks, he was eager to learn the extent to which these folks used the available resources to create a pitch for their business idea. SimplyMap proved itself an extremely useful tool – see the NYPL blog for complete details and several examples of SimplyMap in use.

Visit the NYPL Blog.

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SimplyMap 2.0 is Here!

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The GRI team is very excited to announce the launch of SimplyMap 2.0! Completely redesigned, it is now easier than ever to access data and create professional quality thematic maps and reports.

SimplyMap 2.0

We have been working  hard on many improvements – too many to list them all, but here are a few of the most significant changes:

Completely Redesigned Interface
Veteran users of SimplyMap will notice the completely redesigned interface right away. The look and feel of the application have been redesigned from the ground up, with input from librarians, faculty, and students. The new look reduces clutter, freeing up more screen real estate for maps and reports, and puts the most important features and controls right up front where they belong.

Interactive Wizards
Hands-on wizards walk you through step-by-step tutorials of each feature — they will help you create professional thematic maps in just minutes!

Tab-Based Interface
Organize your maps and reports using tabs to instantly switch between all of your SimplyMap projects. Tabs can be renamed, saved, closed, and reopened in seconds, and you can also add tags and keywords to quickly find your work.

Advanced Data Filters
Identify target areas in maps and reports using SimplyMap’s powerful data filters. Locations that do not match your criteria are removed, leaving you with a clear and concise view of your data. Filters can be simple, such as “average income > $50,000,” or can involve multiple variables and conditions.

Collaborate
Share your maps and reports with other SimplyMap users by creating an exact copy of your work that other users can retrieve by clicking on an active link.

Improved Data Search
SimplyMap’s powerful search engine helps users find the data most relevant to their research among more than 75,000 variables using boolean logic. Search the variable name, folder, or source agency in any combination to to see the most popular variables at the top of your list.

Improved Performance
SimplyMap’s code is more efficient than ever, resulting in amazingly fast performance, and the new interface minimizes page reloads, which speeds things up even more.

There is a quick overview, but you really have to try SimplyMap 2.0 for yourself to experience all the benefits first-hand. Contact us today to arrange a free trial or to upgrade at no additional cost.

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ACRL iPad 2 Winner!

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The GRI team would like to congratulate Barbara Van Hooser from Tennessee State University, our iPad 2 raffle prize winner from the Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) show in Philadelphia last month. Congratulations Barbara!

iPad 2

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The Most Socially Networked Cities in America

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Men’s Health magazine decided to crown one town America’s Most Socially Networked City, and has generated quite a buzz in the process. Their survey examined the number of Facebook and LinkedIn users per capita, followed by overall Twitter usage (NetProspex). They also looked at traffic generated by the major social networks, including Myspace, Friendster, Reddit, and Digg (analyzed by ad network Chitika). And they used SimplyMap to factor in the percentage of households that check out chat rooms and blogs. The result was a list of the top 100 socially networked cities.

The top socially networked city might surprise you. None of the hotbeds of high tech like San Francisco, Seattle, or even Palo Alto rose to the top spot – it was venerable and staid Washington D.C. that took home the title.

The story has been picked up around the Internet; here are a few blogs and other sites sharing the news – some proud representatives of high ranking cities, others, not so much.

Did your city make the list?


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GRI to Exhibit at ACRL in Philadelphia March 30 – April 1

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The GRI team is looking forward to exhibiting at ACRL 2011 at the PA Convention Center in Philadelphia, March 30 – April 1, 2011.

Every other year, ACRL offers its premier professional development event devoted exclusively to the needs of academic and research librarians.

The Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL), a division of the American Library Association, is a professional association of academic librarians and other interested individuals. It is dedicated to enhancing the ability of academic library and information professionals to serve the information needs of the higher education community and to improve learning, teaching, and research.

Click here for conference info.

Exhibit Hours:
Wednesday, March 30 – 5:40 – 7:30PM Opening Reception in Exhibit Hall
Thursday, March 31 – 9:00 am – 4:30 pm Exhibit Hall Open
Friday, April 1 – 9:30am – 4:00pm Exhibit Hall Open

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