Put a photo on a place that matters.
Your hometown. The coast you keep going back to. The city where you met. Buy The World is a shared world map where you can claim a digital square, for nothing, and put a little of your life on it.
Exploring is free and so is claiming. Look around before you give anybody your email address.
How it works
- Find a place. Search for a town or an address, or move around the globe. Select a square to see the area it covers and whether anybody is holding it.
- Claim it with a photo. The picture is the claim: choose one and the square is yours from that moment. You need an account, which is an email address and a six-digit code we send to it, and you can claim one square an hour.
- Keep it. A claim carries a shield of 24 hours. Press the button on your own square to put another 24 hours on it; it comes back every 6 hours. When a shield runs out, anybody can claim that square.
- Or keep it for good. Protection is $2.00 once, for one square, and a protected square can never be claimed by anybody.
What does it cost?
Claiming is free. There is no price on a square, no subscription and no renewal fee. The only thing here with a price is protection: $2.00 USD for one square, paid once, and the total is shown before you pay.
What am I holding?
A licence to display an image, a caption and a link on a digital map cell, for as long as you hold it. The map follows real-world coordinates, but a square gives you no ownership of the physical land.
Can I lose it?
Yes, and this is the part to read twice. A square is held only while its shield holds. When it runs out, anybody may claim that square: the image goes, the caption and the link go, and the square belongs to whoever claimed it. We write to you when a shield is running low and again if you lose one, but the shield is the rule. Protection is the way out of that, and it is the only one.
Can I give a square to somebody else?
Yes. You can offer a square you hold to an email address, and it moves only if the person there accepts. Protection travels with it. See the terms for the conditions.
Why is there a countdown?
The project begins with 100 days on its clock. Each square protected adds 3.65 days. Claiming is free and adds nothing to it — what keeps the map alive is what pays for it. If the clock reaches zero, the map stops being published. Protection is about nobody else taking your square; it is not a promise that a website will stay online forever.
Who is behind it?
Buy The World is operated by Spaghetti Code, CVR 39003252. Questions about the project or a payment can go to [email protected].
Read the terms, privacy policy and content rules. Editors can use the press facts and image, or browse public map stories.