The Geospatial Revolution

Peter BattySpatial Networking

DRCOG / DRDCJanuary 14, 2010

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Overview

• Mainstream at last!

• Data sharing

• A real-time, multimedia view of the world

• Crowdsourcing

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GIS was a specialized backroom technology for many years

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Doug SeabornAM/FM conference, 1992

“1995: the year that GIS disappeared”

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Disruptive technology

Functionality /performance

Time

Established technology

Disruptive technology

MainstreamMarketrequirements

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Now much easier to include location data

Free or cheap map data

Geocoding Location tracking

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Finally, geospatial data is just another data type

flickr.com/photos/26664862@N04/2499573972/7

The neogeographersGoogle

MicrosoftOpen Source... and more

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Geo moving to the mainstream

1996 MapQuest

2005 Google Earth (Keyhole)

2005 Google Maps

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Fun and coolPerformance

Ease of useAPI

Continued innovation

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3D buildingsBirds eye view

PhotosynthSQL Server

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Strong in databaseStrong in web mapping

Weaker on desktopData improving fast

Spans both “GIS” and “neogeo” spaces

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“But these new systems are just simple web mapping, they’re not GIS”

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Cartography

Andy Allan, Cloudmade

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Data creation and maintenance

Upcoming Mapzen editorCloudmade

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Here’s a print of Chinatown, San Francisco.

Instead of gargoyles, we’re using more appropriate bits of icon and text to recognize the corners.

Here you can see that someone has walked around Green Street and noted address information and a few businesses.

This is not information that you’d be able to get from a satellite image.

It’s also information that don’t really need a GPS for: the roads are already in place, but they need extra eye-level information.

Data creation and maintenance

“Walking Papers” for OpenStreetMap Stamen Design17

Geospatial analysis

Stamen Design

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Geospatial analysisFortiusOne / GeoCommons

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Graphic showing “peace” Maybe hippies holding hands

(Shouldn’t fight neogeo vs GIS - all same problem)

neogeography = GIS20

Data Sharing

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Geodata standards

Lightweight Heavyweight

geoRSS

KML

geoJSON

GML

Shape

Mashups

Google Search

OGC*

Portals

WMS

WFS

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3 rules for evolvable systems

Clay Shirky, 1996shirky.com/writings/evolve.html

Only solutions that produce partial results when partially implemented can succeed

What is, is wrong

Orgel's Rule: "Evolution is cleverer than you are".

Evolvable

Centrally designed

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“If a dataset available on the web is in a format that can't be indexed by Google, does it make a sound?”

Kevin WiebeSafe Software

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<Picture of Jason>

Jason BirchCity of Nanaimo

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Places to share data in the cloud ...

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Google Maps

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Google Maps

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Google Transit

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GeoCommons

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OpenStreetMap

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PublicEarth

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Economics of data sharing

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Economics of data sharing

“Information wants to be free”

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A real-time, multimedia view of the world

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September 7, 200946

October 19, 200947

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Microsoft Photosynth51

Google Streetview52

Microsoft Virtual Earth

Manhattan

maps

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C3 Technologies

Las Vegas

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prototypegame.org

Manhattan

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Live

VideoLive

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The Sensor Web

Need a spatial context to make sense of all this

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Location sensing

Cell towersWi-Fi

GPSRFID

UWB

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New TomTom traffic speed datasetderived from

600 billionspeed readings from users

flickr.com/photos/rutlo/3164449930/

real time data within

3 minutes

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location based servicesare real at last!

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Demand Response

Storage Renewable Energy

Intelligent devices and control systems

Smart Grid“The Internet brought to our electric system”

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Will have the ability to know where everything is - and what is happening - all the time

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Crowdsourcing

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Web

publishing participation

2.0Web1.0

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Wikipedia

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Hurricane KatrinaNew Orleans

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Community generated data

scipionus.com67

LandgatePerth, Western Australia

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Google MapMaker“The future is user

created data”Michael Jones, Google

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OpenStreetMap

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December 3, 2007

July 7, 2009

Google OpenStreetMap

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Cape RoyalGrand Canyon, AZ

USACropston

England

Denver, COUSA

Denver, COUSA

“Mousetrap” junction of I-25 and I-70

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momentum!!

132,764users

OSM stats from May 2009

24mkm of highways

34mkm of ways

NAVTEQ had 18m km of highways in Dec 2007

crazy

flickr.com/photos/pimpmasterjazz/2601898276/

200,000+

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What about quality?

“OSM quality is beyond good enough, it is a product that can be used for a wide range of activities”

Dr Muki Haklay of UCL

Based on a detailed analysishttp://tinyurl.com/mukiosm

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2007 dataDatabase

69 countries11m miles (18m km) of roads18m points of interest

PeopleField force 700Central production 270Technology 500Total 3349

Financial Revenue $853m (~€604m) Data creation & distribution costs $396m (~€280m)

“Creating, maintaining and delivering a comprehensive, high quality map database is a

multi-step, labor-intensive process. We currently employ over 270 employees in our centralized production facility and a global

workforce of over 700 geographic analysts in 32 countries”

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Crowdsourcing is a paradigm shift for data creationflickr.com/photos/jamescridland/613445810/

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http://flic.kr/p/5TeTqw

Food for thought

SimplicityEvolvability

SearchabilityCrowdsourcing

Existing infrastructureCloud

Public impactFree

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In summary ... a wild ride ahead!

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?peter@ebatty.com

geothought.blogspot.comtwitter.com/pmbatty

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