Here is an interesting new community mapping project in the same vein as the pop vs soda mapping project.

Wired magazine has an interesting article about a webpage entitled commoncensus.org, that is designed to help shed light on how Americans perceive their surroundings. Specifically, the website directs you to provide information on where you live (address) and from there it asks you to identify which area (community, city, etc..) you identify with the most. The end product is a U.S. map that provides a better understanding of which areas/regions that people associate themselves with. This appears to be a part of a mini-wave of non-academic research into behavioral geography issues that is taking advantage of the internet and its unique ability to get responses from a diverse cross-section of people across the U.S. While methodologically these projects would not pass a peer review, they are interesting and provide some great maps as can be seen on the pop vs soda website.