The Web thing which lets you drag a country or economy over any other and see how Mercator stuffs up their relative sizes is brilliant for getting a sense why people want this.

Like a lot of "colour the empire pink" schooled people (yes right up to the 60s and 70s that map was used in uk schools) I somehow I gained an initial impression NZ and JP were tiny.

> The Web thing which lets you drag a country or economy over any other and see how Mercator stuffs up their relative sizes is brilliant for getting a sense why people want this.

It's called "The True Size Of..." https://thetruesize.com

And indeed it's a brilliant tool.