Excluding Effects of Cartographic Epistemologies — Thinking About Mapping Paradigms in OpenStreetMap and Wikimapia

Although the emergence of collaborative online mapping platforms has radically lowered access barriers to cartographic practices, many studies have shown how participation in online mapping is biased socially towards more privileged groups and geographically towards higher income regions. Yet, exclusion-mechanisms beyond those socio-economic divides have hardly been considered so far. Adding one such possible cause of social exclusion that is not directly linked to socio-economic factors, this paper makes an argument for the consideration of cartographic epistemologies. We illustrate the exclusion-mechanisms of cartographic epistemologies through two exemplary case studies, focusing on the ground-truth agenda of OSM and on Wikimapia's endeavor to describe the world.