In my opinion, Mind Maps are not great for organizing information, learning things or keeping track of things. Notice how the Github read-me itself is formed like a Table of Contents. Table of Contents (or other organized lists) are better for organizing your information and placing it in thematically similar topics, etc.
In cases where you're presenting or recalling information, the more linear narrative of a Table of Contents is superior. Use your brain's natural triggered associations to tie subjects together or to recall related topics, and use hard-copy writing to commit concrete, factual and clear information to that 'external' memory.
There is a reason that we've been using TOC like structures much more than Mind Maps. Mind Maps are terrible. We use TOCs, concrete lists, tools like Universal Decimal Classification and Dewey Decimal Classification to organize information, because they work and cover up the weak areas that human brains have.
Google Image search "Mind Map". You will see colorful distracting pictures like this: https://www.mindtools.com/media/Diagrams/mindmap.jpg
If you want random associations, follow links on the web. Browse Wikipedia, open new random tabs. Learn new topics, discover new interesting things! Just don't use Mind Maps.
I do agree with you that mind maps have their flaws and limitations. But I found most curated list and most content in general to be quite rigid in structure. These mind maps should let the users explore and be guided through arrows.
And the big problem that I find is that google and other search engines are a black box. You have to know what you want to ask for to get an answer. The poses a big problem because many don't know what to ask.
Wikipedia is great too but I found it to lack in the visualisation aspect. Everything is connected but many people don't know exactly how and where and with what it is connected. These kinds of visualisations are very popular on the internet (https://github.com/kamranahmedse/developer-roadmap is one example) because they do bring clarity as to what it is the person doesn't know. However this repository although great, it just shows an image.
With these mind maps I can replicate the same but make it interactive. Now users can not only see what they don't know, but if they do want to learn it, they don't have to waste time online finding resources, they just click on a link and see what the best way of learning the topic is. If any questions arise when they are learning the content, then the search engine of their choice will answer these questions.
I also try to solve the problem of dependencies of knowledge. For example if user wants to learn 'machine learning'. I show that machine learning requires knowledge of statistics and linear algebra (http://i.imgur.com/A75JMNt.png) and then give links to the mind maps of both of these topics so user can learn them. There should be no wandering around and wasting time finding resources and being lost.