This visualization from Tweetping.net shows Twitter activity in real time, worldwide. Using Twitter’s API, Tweetping.net tracks the total number of tweets, including word and character count, generated per second. It also tracks the latest mentions and hashtags used, categorized by region. The lit areas show where Twitter activity is happening at the moment.
For more, visit: The Atlantic: What Twitter Really Looks Like
Women are not allowed to take part in front-line combat roles in most nations. According to the map shown above, published by the Washington Post, front-line combat positions for women are permitted mostly in western nations.
Countries that formally allow women in combat positions (red) include: Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, France, Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Lithuania, Estonia, Romania, Eritrea, Israel, North Korea, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States, where the ban on women in front-line combat has been recently lifted.
Countries where women are formally allowed in other major combat roles (orange), such as artillery and fighter pilots, include: the United Kingdom, Serbia, South Africa, Pakistan and South Korea.
Chicago is the only city in the United States with tough gun control laws. Gun shops are prohibited, and so are shootings ranges. It is illegal for private citizens to carry guns in public places. Despite this fact, Chicago has experienced a high number of gun-related deaths, 500 homicides in 2012 and so far 40 in the first month of 2013.
Guns recovered by the Chicago police in the last twelve years came mainly from the within the state of Illinois, followed by the states of Indiana, Mississippi, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas. Overall, the provenance of guns confiscated in Chicago pointed to all 50 states, Puerto Rico and Guam.
Resource: The New York Times: Where 50,000 Guns Recovered in Chicago Came From
According to an article of The Guardian, in 2008 the defense budget of the United States was $607 billion, ten times that of China and the UK, fifteen times that of Germany, seventeen times that of Russia, and twenty five times that of India. In fact, the defense budget of the top nine countries combined (shown in the first graphic) adds up to $377 billion, or 62% of the military spending of the U.S. Those numbers would make the U.S. the top country in defense spending in the world.
But, if one looks at defense spending numbers as a percentage of the GDP, we have a different story. In that case, Myanmar becomes the top defense spender with a military budget of 26% of its GDP, followed by Jordan, Georgia and Saudi Arabia. The U.S. moves to number eight, with a military budget of 4% of its GDP. Large military spending by these nations is due to different factors. Some of these countries are dictatorships, some are monarchies. Others need to actively protect their borders from foreign aggression.
To read the article from The Guardian, visit: The Guardian: Data Store – Show and Tell, Information is beautiful: war games
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Prostitution is defined as the practice of providing sexual services to another individual in exchange for payment.
The legal status of prostitution varies from country to country. In some countries the practice is legal and regulated like in the case of Germany, Brazil, Netherlands, Canada, Argentina, Indonesia and Singapore, to name a few. In others it is illegal, with extreme cases where it is punishable by death. In the United States prostitution is illegal, except for 11 counties in the state of Nevada. As seen in the map above, it is illegal in most countries.
Some countries have a limited legality policy such as in the case of Australia, where prostitution is legal in most of the country, except in Southern Australia where its practice is restricted. Other countries with limited legality include Bangladesh, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iceland, India, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal, New Zealand, Norway and Sweden.
There are no laws regarding prostitution in countries like Bulgaria, Guinea-Bissau, Indonesia, Lesotho and Mozambique.
For more details visit: ProCon.org: 100 Countries and Their Prostitution Policies
Although statistics about trafficking of females are unreliable due to a number of reasons, starting with the clandestine nature of the activity, the WomanStats Project has managed to gather one of the most comprehensive data sets to date about the issue. One of the maps they produced, displayed above, illustrates the magnitude of the problem worldwide. You may find it shocking that in this day and age trafficking is not illegal and is even common in several countries, including Egypt, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, and Iran. To find out more about the issue, and find out what you can do to help, visit the Stop Violence Against Women site.
The Happy Planet Index (HPI) measures how countries provide their citizens with a long and happy existence within their borders.
The HPI measures three variables: experienced well-being, life expectancy and environmental footprint. Environmental footprint is a measure of resource consumption. Scores for each variable are combined to create an overall measurement, where the color green represents the best performance for all three variables. The HPI has been calculated for 151 countries.
The highest ranking countries on the HPI are: Costa Rica, Vietnam, Belize, Colombia and El Salvador. See table below:
For more information about the HPI methodology, definitions and the complete list of ranked countries, please visit: The Happy Planet Index
While the debate goes on in Congress regarding gun control, it is interesting to see that many members of Congress that will be voting on the issue, received donations from no other than the National Rifle Association (NRA). On the graphic above, compiled by the Washington Post, we can see that the party that benefited the most from NRA donations in 2012 was the Republican party.
Recipients of NRA donations are selected by the NRA based on a grading system that includes how a particular Congress member supported the NRA on gun issues in the past.
For the interactive graphic that allows you to check for names of candidates that received financial contributions by the NRA visit: The Washington Post: How the NRA exerts influence over Congress
According to a World Gold Council report, world official gold reserves are estimated to be 31,575 tonnes as of January 2013. The United States ranks number one in official gold holdings with 8,133 tonnes. It is followed by Germany, the IMF (International Monetary Fund), Italy, France, China, Switzerland, Russia, Japan and the Netherlands. All other countries combined hold 7,325.5 tonnes in gold reserves. The countries in that group include India, Taiwan, Portugal, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The Euro area holds 10,783 tonnes in gold reserves.
Resource Investor reports that central banks increased their official gold holdings to 500 tonnes in 2012 from 465 tonnes in 2011.
Resources:
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Temperatures for the U.S. contiguous states in 2012 were 1 degree Fahrenheit warmer than the previous record temperatures of 1998. Based on preliminary data the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOOA) created the map above, where it can be clearly seen that across the nation warmer temperatures were registered. Nineteen states from Massachusetts to Utah, experienced record warmer temperatures.
2012 was also a year of record low levels of precipitation, below average. Drier than average conditions affected the central parts of the United States, with negative consequences for agriculture. The winter season 2011-2012 was affected by higher than normal warm temperatures as well.