The Vignelli map never really went away, though. Graphic designers turned it into something approaching an object of worship. In 2004, Michael Bierut of Pentagram wrote an eloquent homage to it ...

Paul Allen, who co-founded Microsoft 30 years ago with Bill Gates and is one of the world's richest men, donated $100 million to create a searchable 3-D digital map called the Allen Brain Atlas.