BREAKING NOW:
Creator of the Map, Ben Charlton, removes it from his site. Here’s his post explaining why:
Update
I have decided to take down the map. Many people have commented that the map does give a false impression of accuracy, despite my making this clear, and I’m tempted to agree. I do not want to single anybody out and by removing the accuracy from the map it is possible that it ends up incorrectly implying a property contains a BNP member. It has been suggested that an inaccurate map that doesn’t make that clear is worse than publishing the list itself, and I think that’s a reasonable comment.
[More coverage on this story here and here.]
[Updated: Please see further updates below]
Original story:
As news about the leaking of the membership list of the far-right/racist British National Party broke in the UK, it quickly became a headline story in the mainstream media. But the chatter amongst geeks on Twitter this morning was about the possible “mashup” that could be done of the members’ postcodes with a Google Map. As soon as that idea had propagated, it was bound to happen, since the list has been available on Bitorrent and on Wikileaks for around 24 hrs now. Frankly I thought it would take a little longer, but as I debated the issue on Twitter this morning, someone sent me a link to an already-built map.
And it’s scary.
The map is a sea of red pins, indicating that there are in fact BNP members spread pretty widely across the UK. London is barely visible under the map. Zooming out means that the map can no longer render all the data points adequately. It’s worth remembering that Britain is in fact one of the least racist, most tolerant nations in Europe, but the map looks pretty scary covered in these large red pins.
Ben Charlton, owner of the site Spod.cx has created the map here.
He writes:
As various news organisations have been reporting, the membership list for the British National Party has been leaked online. It seems a court injunction kept this quiet for some time, but the list has well and truly escaped – currently hosted on bittorrent and the always excellent wikileaks site.
Curious about the list, I managed to find a copy and after checking it for the obvious odd family members or people you know and think might be members, I thought it’d be cool to make a Google Maps mashup of the data. I extracted the postcodes from the member list and converted them into latitude and longitude co-ordinates, which are then plotted on the map.
The map is a bit slow to render, especially if there are a lot of data points, but it’s interesting to see the distribution of members. As I’m only generating a list of latitude and longitude points, I’m not revealing any of the actual list data. If you want to find out who the hate-filled racist that lives near you is, you’ll need to find and look through the list yourself.
The implications of this action are pretty big. I speculated on Twitter this morning that a mashup which identified the actual locations of BNP members would be highly problematic, and possibly even subject to vigilante attack. However I still believe that a map which showed more general areas, like towns and cities, could actually be helpful to local authorities for creating policies to tackle attitudes towards diversity. If you were a local councillor and had been made aware that there were lots of BNP members in your area, you may be able to do something about the attitudes which lead to support for such a far-right political party.
But now this more accurate map is out of the bag, and others are probably planning similar maps, the implications are far reaching. What no-one would wish is for a witch-hunt to begin. Plotting this map will make the data available to just about anyone. My personal opinion is that in this, quite accurate form, it should be taken down. On the one hand the BNP has a notorious history of violence. On the other, it also has a history of attracting disaffected young people who later regret joining – their lives should not be tarred by their actions as naive youngsters.
UPDATE 1: I emailed Ben Charlton about the map and emailed him some questions to which he has now responded.
He says the map is not as a accurate I feared: “I deliberately only pulled out postcodes from the file, converted those to latitude/longitude, then stripped a chunk of precision off the end. It gives a vague location, probably to street level, but it’s certainly not accurate by any means.”
1. Why create the map?
“I thought what I’ve seen a lot of people say – it would be interesting to visualise the data in a way that makes sense to people. It’s all very well being able to look for people in your home town, but it’s nice to see easily how that compares to membership in other locations.”
2. How accurate are people’s locations? Would someone be able to work out they lived next door to a member.
“The original list is very specific – listing addresses and names. I deliberately only pulled out postcodes from the file, converted those to latitude/longitude, then stripped a chunk of precision off the end. It gives a vague location, probably to street level, but it’s certainly not accurate by any means. Of course, there’s nothing to stop people then looking on the proper list – it’s not hard to find now.”
3. Do you plan to maintain the map?
“It’s based on the leaked list. If there’s a new list leaked I might update it, but for the time being it won’t change.”
4. Are you worried about BNP members identifying you?
“It’s always a concern, but I deliberately kept my app vague so as not to directly identify anyone as it’s not my intention to cause upset. I’d hope I’m not a target for too much abuse – especially compared to what a lot of other sites are saying.”
Update 2: However, an inaccurate map could be more dangerous than an accurate one. As others point out in comments below, the Google pin can, and perhaps should, be changed to something more like a “circle with fading semi-transparent edges” to prevent someone getting the wrong idea about their neighbour.
Update 3: Map creator Ben Charlton has now posted a heat-map of the data here but it largely shows what you might expect – that BNP membership roughly maps to urban centres of population.
Addendum: Others are making interesting use of the data, such as this graph by region.
And at least some can see the funny side now.
What I find very interesting about this are the areas where I expected to see members and there are none or only a handful.
I do think it shouldn’t be as accurate as this though. Checking a village that I know there is a cul-de-sac with 10 houses..one now outed as a BNP member…I know that one of those 8 houses is inhabited by a family originally from Sri Lanka and another by a family from Grenada. Would they want to know one of their neighbours belongs to the BNP?
Hi, I had a previous list of BNP membership as it came across when I was looking for my boyfriend name on internet. I tell you what, he’s name was among the list member and ALL DEATILS ARE TRUE! Its exactly my bf home address with his house phone number and also mobile phone number. Now, since Nick Griffin said he will have problem with any BNP member marrying non-white…am I going to have a problem since we are planning to get married? More over, Im a muslim! Thanks for reading.
Let’s respond with pitch forks, spades and fire torches!
I think this shows an interesting limitation of Google Maps – as every single member of the BNP is represented by this massiv big red pin, it is no wonder that the map looks pretty red. To turn this into something more meaningful you would need to cluster the data points into more meaningful chunks and ideally cross-reference them against a chart of general population density – heatmaps work rather well for something like that.
The current graphical representation looks scary as hell – but we are talking about 10,635 BNP members mapped on a country with 50m+ people living here (which is 0.02% of total population!). It is certainly arguable that 10,635 BNP members are 10,635 too many – but it is not the epidemic the Google Maps mashup suggests it is.
Actually that’s not a limitation, Google Maps lets you use any graphic you want as the ‘pin’. By using a smaller circle with fading semi-transparent edges you could get a pretty good approximation of a population density map. How about it Ben?
Wot Pascal said – 0.0174% – UK pop = 60,975,000 according to: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=6
But admittedly, he was faster on the draw than me.
Definitely needs to be a heat map: pins are an inappropriate way of visualising population density (which at this volume, this is).
+1 to density ratio per population. And even overlaying it against immigration density, unemployment, social class, income, dominance of primary/secondary/tertiary industry etc
Rather than the sensationalism, this could actually become a very useful way of understanding societal trends and understanding root causes. Not “where do they live? let’s lynch them!”, but “what are the demographic conditions that are, statistically, causing this undesirable behaviour?”
That’s something the web ought to be quite good at, a la http://www.gapminder.org – now Google.
(Yes, my parents were geographers)
Interesting, but by no means alarming. What might be more useful is correlating the density of ethnic minority populations against BNP member locations to test a few hypothesis?
Is BNP membership a result of feeling ‘beseiged’ by ethnic minorities or a result of little contact with them? Or more simply, are diverse communities a good structure for minimising extremism?
BNP membership is a result of people native to this country being sick to the back teeth of people coming here and bringing their backward ways with them. If you’re a muslim you should act as we do, not act like you’re still in Afghanistan.
ignorant comments
would suggest you travel beyond your local tesco and see how upstand british behaviour isnt abroad
It’s interesting because I just alerted one of my clients who’s property was marked by the map. We’re in a very rural area, there was only one flag in the area and the postcode showed the flag in the correct place, but since there were only two properties there it could have had a negative effect on my client’s business. The list showed that it was my client’s neighbour who was the BNP member. I think the map was fascinating but as I say, it is a dangerous tool when you live in am area where there are very few houses.
It’s interesting because I just alerted one of my clients who’s property was marked by the map. We’re in a very rural area, there was only one flag in the area and the postcode showed the flag in the correct place, but since there were only two properties there it could have had a negative effect on my client’s business. The list showed that it was my client’s neighbour who was the BNP member. I think the map was fascinating but as I say, it is a dangerous tool when you live in an area where there are very few houses.
There is a much better preforming mashup at http://www.bnpnearme.co.uk, which is collecting all the members in each postcode, which I think is a much more effective use of the data, for the reasons given above.
A map that shows where there are people, there are bigots. Fascinating.
I did a quick-and-dirty count against county and region, see summary numbers/charts here:
by region: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJaEOkd_7K3ACcUn8fj4sLQ
by county: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJaEOkd_7K3CBTloBHmjSNw
Mike Butcher> It’s worth remembering that Britain is in fact one of the least racist, most tolerant nations in Europe.
Proof?
Isn’t this a nationalist statement already?
Then again you seem to accept that you’re in Europe. Not all Brits agree with you.
Where’s the mashup of the prison guards from the list lost a month ago?
‘the chatter amongst geeks on Twitter this morning was about the possible “mashup” ‘
It was suggested last night on Popbitch. Interesting that google mashups have become well known outside geek circles.
I am speechless…
That the most disturbing news i ever eard in years.
And you guys are just saying “oh yeah that’s interesting data”.
Well, shoud we just kill these guys for being BNP ?
What about a mashup of jews residants with yellow stars instead of pins ?
What about a mashup of muslims, christians, gays, black, white, yellow, blue peoples ?
Have you all guys lost your mind ?!
Yes we should be killing these racist scumbags!
you facist bastard .
im not a racist or facist but everybody deserves a fair chance to do what they like within the law of the country they reside but it seems that british folk are unable to have that fairness . im welsh a small minority of britian but proud of my backround and enjoy celebrating st david’s day . why cant the english celebrate st george in some english areas. fairness for british folk and lets have a great britian day
I’ve done a visualisation of BNP members per 100 inhabitants using that regions spreadsheet; here.
I’m not sure the regions he/she used map to the NatStats classification. For example, I used the population figure for “East of England” for “East Anglia”, totalled “North East” and “Yorkshire and the Humber” for “NE England”, and decided totally arbitrarily that “South Central England” was probably closest to “West Midlands” and therefore “Midlands” should be “East Midlands”.
I wish a commie would come round to my house and tell me who I should vote for, I’d send him straight to the dentist.
Rock on brother!
Grabbed the excel file off the net, was going for a torrent off TPB, but it had been wiped, a search for the BNP brought up another torrent and some file share site. The excel sheet is about 2 MB and lists a few people near me in great detail.
Pity no-one can release some extremist left wing party as well…
Strongly suspect that Nu Labour have their sticky paw in the mess
Maps all well and good, but having the raw data in your hand..
List is too detailed in the mundane to be a fake, goes on about some girl called Linda (15) where her dad is an activist.
Hope that no-one attacks anyone for having different views than what they hold
Maybe, though it will also be true of some country. In fact, in the original form the statement would be true of at most 12 countries, as a mental exercise which ones would you put in that list?
Proof? Nationalist parties have tended not to do as well in Britain as they have in a number of other countries (Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Denmark for starters, I’m sure I could go on).
As a data point – I’m a member of a visible minority, I’ve traveled around Europe and would concur anecdotally with the statement.
I have just seen I am on the list and it is available as a torrent, oops!
As a BNP member, proud to be British, proud of British history and proud of my country I support the BNP because they will fight “The Pen is mightier than the Sword” for every british citizens right’s! regardless of their skin colour and faith. However, Its not my fault we’re all branded as “racists” & “nazi’s”, oh! “fascists” damn… do most of you even understand what your saying! What is Nazi’s anyway, They are Nationalists, people who will fight for their countries traditions! Most people will bring up Adolf Hitler, or WW2 even Jews. Unfortunately, Adolf Hitler promote nationalism in times when it was dying, and democracy was becoming dominant, we all know how many people have died in the Middle East, Asia and even at home in the name of democracy! Besides, You all call your democratic people? You believe everyone should have a right, even those terrorists that bombed Glasgow, London and the US? I assure you all… all British people Black & White or Yellow, or Pink
that among these massive surges of Immigrants Legal & Illegal are terrorists wanting to get us back for what we’ve done to their lands throughout history and what the UK & US continue to do in the name “War on Terror”.
Hitler was a Socialist. Nazi’s were also Socialist. British National Party are not Socialists. The British National Party are Nationalists.
Adolf Hitler promoted Nationalist views too… aswell as many others.
Can you tell me where this can be read?
Anyway… I’m glad that my country can offer many people a better life, and I feel sorry for those at home that struggle while we seem to have no care left for those struggling and our veterans, and pensioners.
The United Kingdom is not bigger than the threat at hand, and because the “United” Kingdom isn’t soo United, do not think we will beat terrorism that easily, because the problem is bigger than the Media/government make it out too be.
Oh! Could you imagine those street wars in Northern Ireland, or in Africa on the Streets of Britain… Don’t think we’re going to stop the problem because we have laws, that are bits of paper. We even don’t show our Police alot of respect, that includes those officers that had Shot De Menezes. They were doing their Job, protection you “The British public”. Anyway, our Police aren’t all armed, nor trained to carry a side arm. Imagine the streets of Britain all in choas?
This is just to say that the map shown above is a grave exaggeration of the reality it tries to reflect. It claims to show a suggested 10635 British National Party members across the southern part of England and as Butcher describes, “London is barely visible under the map.” However, the truth is that this country contains more than 60 million people and if one chooses to look at this realistically and from rational perspective, it can be clearly observed that in terms of relativity, pins which represented membership or support to any other political UK parties would massively outnumber those shown here. So please, put down the keyboard, and step away from the moral panic.
and Adam, you think that all 60 million vote? and do you believe that all the figures released by our government are correct?
Besides, not all political parties have millions of members anyway.
It’s surely a widely held belief that figures can be manipulated to produce exaggerated statistics but this is quite clearly irrelevant to the argument in hand. Indeed you are correct that not all of those sixty-some million people vote; only around 67.1% are old enough to vote and statistically are more likely to vote New Labor or Conservative. The point is, this larger demographic over-shadows the ten thousand plus members highlighted in this map of British National Party members.
Your right that mostly alot of people will vote for Conservative or Labour, and my views between the both of them are extremely far. Personally even though Labout have made alot pf mistakes are far better than the Conservatives especially when Cameron and the rest of them pose as “people” who understand the ordinary British citizen, damn the man doesn’t even know his own bills (taxpayer paying them?).
The list doesn’t include all the BNP members anyway, I’d guess around 200k people are in views of the BNP and not all have become an official member for alot of reasons… and thats only from what I read.
I live in Bulgaria but support the BNP, I am fed up with people on thisisgrimsby calling me a hypocrite, get your head out the sand, your country needs you and all Britons must stand shoulder to shoulder to reclaim our country, the EU and the main political parties don’t want people to know the truth about immigration.
I couldn’t seem to post… anyway, on Google you should be able to search the political movements behind the Nazi Party of Germany. If you really wanted to find out alot of stuff “in detail” you would need to browse the archives in London, Germany and Russia.
I thought I’d add a few other things… You alot of you hard working people of Britain, & doing your best to make ends meet, even struggling… however, have no time to worry about whats really going on here in Britain, or outside in the “real” world. I’m talking to most of you anti-BNP (Anti-british) people that rely on the Media or our government to tell you whats happening. YouTube, search around on there for “Muslims Hatred” or “Muslims hate America” those sort of things, and look how freely alot of those muslim protestors that are British, or American or even European burn our flags and paise osama and say things like “Bomb britain” & “kill british people” those sort of things… You will see alot of them, videos that are real and even happening, most in communities that are now mostly muslim or whatever (I’m sure there are alot of muslims that do not want violence, but there are alot that do and alot of them are even born in our countries) Don’t think our government will fix this problem, because eventually the Streets of Britain will be a war zone, and it’ll more likely happen when our Soldiers are abroad fighting wars, and the people at home are working hard trying to keep a roof of their familys head, and food on the table.
This looks more like a operation than a leak. Its discreditation at a mass level. Very worrying!
There are so many foreigners in Grimsby, I moved to Bulgaria, VOTE BNP!
It is unsafe in Grimsby because so many foreigners live there, I moved abroad to get away from all these foreigners, drugs and chavs. I am happy in Bulgaria. VOTE BNP!
The leak done the party wonders. there membership really pulled together, increased dramatically along with there share of the votes.
Good to see the scum concentrations. these are shit people
Having read all the above comments it is clear that the rational arguemants are certainly from the BNP supporters/ members. It is the immaturity of a few, including the last posting that holds little creadance other that to irritate, as they are clearly unable to form a reasonable reply without resorting to violent retorts, all of which they are unlikely to be capable of anyway.
I feel that we have digressed from the original topic somewhat but this is what debate does. As such I would like to offer my thoughts.
The BNP have moved on so much from the movements and behaviours of the National Front. A political group of which I totally find abhorent. As such many of the BNP’s policies within their manifesto are undoubtedly what decent British people want. I can say that because having canvassed many people on the subject of immigration and the unmanaged influx of human detritus we have unfortunatey adopted on our sovereign shores.
Let me make one thing perfectly clear to anyone who now thinks I’m a rascist or something similar. I am more that happy to welcome and retain persons, of any crede or colour, in this country if they are willing and accept the British ethos and live like us. I draw the line at the clearly devisive, archaic Muslim religion which has gained a too larger foothold in British society. This has to be stopped if the British people want to retain our identity and heritage.
It is evident from areas such as Bradford, to name but one area, the pakistanis particularly have no intention of living the British way as they live together in their own self made commumities, apart from maybe a minority. As such they should be encourage back to their homeland where they can practice their faith and live their way. It is clear that the Muslim religion does not gel with the British Christian based society, however I have no religious persuasion myself I feel that religion should be weaned from society completely. If people want faith that is up to them.
This country has to stop being manipulated by the doo-gooding left wing minority and soon. These fools think that we are the worlds panacea to every other countries problems, well we’re not and people are sick of the influx of economic migrant dros that get looked after and given priority before our own elderly and needy.
There is no arguemant against what I have said because it’s common sense. We can’t be of any use to other needy countries until we are functioning properly and economically as a nation.
Well said Bill Webb, I couldn’t have worded it better myself, and I know of many many people where I live have these views too.
I personally appear on the BNP list. Not because I am a member, but because I made a contribution to their cause after my colleague was blown to bits beyond recognition in the London tube. Making a donation was my way of coming to terms with his death.
So before people judge the people on this list, just understand that there may be a personal reason why they are on it.
We do have a real problem in this country of individuals coming from lawless societies and not adhering to British laws and ways of life.
For your information, I am not racist, my partner is asian and lives with me in this country.
im speaking for myself here and may represent many many others ‘ who feel as i do ..
im so infuriated and sick to the back teeth of ‘newspapapers’ the media creating there filth and lies against there own people..
the time has come now when we can say we have had enough of all the lie’s and deciet we have been fed since the thatcher got in power.. its not who’s in power anymore?
its who is going to represent an english society that’s had enough and sick to the back teeth of being preached too.. and told to behave and have to listen to back pocket media conservitive/labour bullshit .. we have had enough the english folk have been conned ‘ripped off’ and abused ‘ my family never fought wars for anyone else other than us ‘english society is ruined in the working class ‘and the working class made britain what is once was ”now it is ruined ”
so why should people turn to the ‘BNP’ because there is nothing left to vote for? ”NO because we have nowhere else to go ” il give nick griffin credit he speaks what most want to say but dare not ”’ that lid will soon be lifted thanx to this man ”
all media lies are always there when a party will threaten there lazy way of life” newspapers backed by politicians ‘thieves as you already know’ these are the real threat that will destroy your england ‘ its an attack on the very essence of our democratic system and the british way of life ..that sadly has now passed.. you can get this back ”follow who you are ”the rest will be history ‘GOD BLESS
All political systems are ultimately Nationalist.
All political systems use fear and hate to motivate support.
All political parties expect loyalty to the party and not the country.
All parties are the same, they are all inhabited by the power hungry, back stabbing, back biting, self serving and corrupt political class.
You could not slip a ‘fag paper’ between any of them.
And most people are sick to the back teeth with all of them.
HAHA H shame, stupid racist people, all those members should loose there jobs !
Thanks Josh for that well thought out retort…. Im guessing that if there was one more ‘cell’ present, you’d be in the plant catagory!!
To all concerned,
As this is a very serious subject matter, please respond with mature points, it is so easy to say in printed form, “I hate this one or that one because of their skin colour or religion” please, put each point forward why one aligns to the BNP and the respondents can reply why they are against them.
Poor Josh, I kept on reading his comment, suffice to say I asked myself “Is Josh a 12 year old boy?”
It is I believe so important to explain one’s opinion openly with no malice to others, we see enough of that from the Lower House and that can be embarrassing.
To date everyone has the right to their say and I may add the right to their vote in whichever way they desire. We do not need hateful comments sprouting from these pages, it is mature discernable opinions we need here from the public.
Yours sincerely,
Mr. Fallon
i would just like to say we are born into this world not knowing anything but die knowing alot why does the things you know have to be of hate anger?, we are born the same way and die the same way which science still cant not explain how and what happens before and after – is this all you want to happen in this life – hate?
Say that you have explain your life to something when you die, what would you say? this life is not the end it wasnt given to hate others – it is an opportunity to do something for good , stop blaming others for things that are wrong in ur own life. You can only change it for the better, why cant we live in peace, why is it so hard? and why is it so easy to hate?
history has shown us decisions or votes make on the bases on blaming others always ends in so much death
Why are People so fed up with the LibLabCon ?
They are not interested in sorting the major issues
out!
England is full up ,the highest population in Europe !
Dangerous murderers walk the streets ,ready to harm
children and the weakest .
Gary Newlove and all the others murdered ! What
about Justice ? Only for the evil ones!