“I was watching TV and noticed an informercial for cure-all vitamin supplement with a unique map background,” writes John Deal, who immediately grabbed a camera and took a few shots for Strange Maps. Good reflexes, John!

“It kind of remembers your Larry King map (#242) – but worse. Australia is still drifting north and Africa has moved into position between Europe and North America. There are two Asias but South America has sunk into Atlantic. Sad. All those poor Brazilians, gone forever.”

A map in a TV studio background performs the same function as a diploma on a professional’s consulting room: it lends an aura of respectability and believability to what goes on there. Maybe putting a really awful map like this in a TV studio background is a subconscious, subliminal way of conveying a message to the viewing public: don’t believe a word we’re saying!