Your Post Code Is the Directions, Not the Destination
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN recommends it whenever zip codes, addresses or geospatial data come up, as a clear explanation of the hidden pattern in post codes.
What it is
CGP Grey explains that postal codes are routing instructions for mail rather than geographic regions. He looks at the quirks and problems this causes.
Recommended by 4 HN commenters across 4 different months, 2025 to 2025.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec cogman10 · 2025-09 · on “Zip Code Map of the United States”
If you find this interesting and you haven't watched it, Go watch "The hidden pattern in post codes" [1] [1] [this video]
Recommends jpjoi · 2025-02 · on “Stop using zip codes for geospatial analysis (2019)”
Zip codes are just weird to use for anything other than mail in general because they’re set up based off infrastructure. CGP Grey has a great video on this: [this video]
Recommends schlauerfox · 2025-04 · on “I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)”
CGP Grey, a youtube channel, has a video on some of the problems of the postal codes and addresses from earlier this year that I learned about alternates to my familiar US based system. [this video]
Recommends Arnavion · 2025-05 · on “Japan Post launches 'digital address' system”
See also this CGP Grey video where he talks about post codes / zip codes in general and mentions Ireland's system. [this video]