Imperial Eukaryotes

Friday fun link: watch four maritime empires grow and decline.

Comments

[Muttley]

I think they forgot Ireland.

[Jozef]

India should've been a much larger bubble than either Canada or Australia.

[J sub D]

Only if they did it by population. By land area ...

[Jozef]

I was more thinking of economic benefit to the empire. Of course, I'm probably wrong - don't know how much Australia or Canada contributed to the British economy back in the first half of the 20th century.

[yet another dave]

not much seeing as Canada became independent in 1867 although Canada did provide over 60,000 dead bodies by 1918, was that for england... or france I always get that confused?

[Aresen]

One of the points Lord Durham made in his report in 1837 was that governing Canada cost the British Treasury about 20 times what the revenues were.

Granting self-government was his second recommendation.

His first was to turn Canada over to the US.

[yet another dave]

lucky for you guys you didn't get us, You did manage to get stuck with Alaska though I heard a very wise American once say that you can see Russia from there

[Aresen]

y - a - d

I live in Victoria.

[yet another dave]

ah, not still lamenting being dumped by the British and getting stuck with us redneck hayseed are you?

[yet another dave]

yea well it only cost the Canadian treasury 10 times what it brings in in revenues....

[Aresen]

I should be glad the Americans were too smart to take us.

Otherwise, I would have been wading through rice paddies in the Mekong Delta ca. 1970.

[JW]

Did I miss Mexico's pustule burst off?

[Syd Henderson]

Mexico splits off around 1821 as "Mexican Empire."

Why do South Africa and Canada split off around 1930?

[Aresen]

Canada and South Africa were technically self-governing colonies until the Statute of Westminister in 1931.

[ev]

Is my computer messed or was there just no sound? I would enjoyed hearing bubbles burst or some similar noise; the bigger the bubble the louder the burst.

[sage]

Is my computer messed

Check its diaper.

But be sure to click the "HD." Four colored circles look fuckin' awesome like that!

[Paul]

I watched the video through an RDP connection, why did they start at 1800? I'd have been curious to see how large (or small) a bubble the U.S. would have been off Britain.

[Frayed Knot]

They also left off the Louisiana Purchase.

[Jesse Walker]

Haiti, too!

[Tim]

It would we interesting if they also included the US, Russia/Soviet Union/Russia, China and Japan as well.

[Aresen]

I'm still not clear what the schematic represents, I think it is land area, but, if so, they should have included Prussia/Germany, the Netherlands and Italy.

[peachy]

Germany would have been fun - a rapid expansion (assuming we're doing something like land area rather than population or revenue) and then an abrupt and complete deflation.

[Aresen]

Twice.

[2999]

The second empire wasn't a maritime empire.(The first empire had shit-tons of Africa colonies.)

[Aresen]

Would you have wanted to cross the North Atlantic by ship in May of 1942?

[eh]

Missing the dutch empire. and I had no idea the french overseas territories were more numerous than the other people. Poor Spain though, their laziness really fucked them over.

[Aresen]

Spain was not lazy. It was the fact that Spain's empire was purely extractive rather than mercantile.

Unlike the British aristocracy, the Spanish aristocracy refused to engage in commerce.

[monolith]

I think the portuguese had a saying that went roughly

The British after praying to their God slaughtered the natives.
The Portuguese after a slight nod to their God slept with them.

[Reasonsjester]

This appears to me to be more an illustration of de-colonization rather than growth and decline of empire. I did not detect the inflation of an empire's strength due to relative increase in national capabilities, nor the effects of wars (Franco-Prussian War, 1871, e.g.) on the balance of power between these four empires.

[Dish of the Day]

Does the "British" blob remind anyone else of Mr. Creosote?

[Lord Jubjub]

Wouldn't the U.S. blob have pretty much filled the screen at about 1990?

[2999]

Yep. Someone once told me that there are 5 truly sovereign countries. United States, China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran.

[sage]

Around 1921 Britain grows a hemmorhoid named Egypt. That thing still needs a big glob of Prep H.

[hmm]

nice find

[Art-P.O.G.]

Very cool.