Dulles, US: World Wildlife Fund (WWF) asked volunteers to identify places that carry or sell paper products made from Sumatran rain forest timber. It also asked them to map those places at https://www.worldwildlife.org/sites/tigers/toiletpaper-map.html. Through this initiative, the WWF aims to monitor the deforestation and ruin of the Sumatran tiger’s habitat. Unsustainable clearing of Sumatra’s tropical rain forests for the ultimate purpose of producing paper products is having a devastating effect on the critically endangered tiger and on other animals such as elephants, rhinos, and orangutans.
Meanwhile, MapHook Inc., a location-based service (LBS) provider, collaborated with the WWF. It offered its LBS application, MapHook, to mark location and tagged relevant images on the WWF map. Volunteers may also continue to use MapHook for their own social networking purposes such as sharing photos, videos and journaling in curated categories of interest, as well as viewing other location based content from MapHook partners, including Groupon, Wikipedia and Yelp.
“Social network applications like ours have a built-in ability to support important global outreach projects like this,” said Dr. Paul Carter, MapHook CEO. “This is a powerful illustration of how organisations can use MapHook to interact with the public in a new and effective way. WWF makes a great partner for us because of their broad appeal, their desire to reach out to the masses and our ability to provide the means. We like that they’re trying to make a difference in places and communities around the world.”
Source: Market Watch
