Slashgeo

Vector One offers an interesting reflexion on the debate between national mapping efforts and public-driven mapping such as OpenStreetMap. From the entry: "As can be seen, there is a wide difference between origins of national mapping agencies and their current operations. The word ‘mapping’ in their titles may confuse matters more than help, particularly to those who equate all spatial or a sense of ‘geospatial’ to the web map alone. These organisations are not solely map agencies. Their tasks and operations vary."

SlashDot is currently having a discussion on the aforementioned topic. At a glance, it seems to be about OpenStreetMap. Here is part of their summary : "Goodchild's paper looks at volunteered geographic information as a special case of the more general Web phenomenon of user-generated content. It covers what motivates large numbers of individuals (often with little formal qualifications) to take part, what technology allows them to do so, how accurate the results are and what volunteered geographic information can add to more conventional sources of such information." Head on over there to discuss and get the link to the original story.

Here's a wrap-up of last month's geonews regarding OpenStreetMap. First is a long discussion on the licence attributed to data contributed to the OpenStreetMap project, an exert: "Many of the problems arise because Creative Commons (the “CC” of our licence), as the name suggests, is largely concerned with “creative works” - music, literature, art, and so on. OpenStreetMap, on the other hand, produces data: a factual, uncontroversial recording of the world around us. [...] In the [Science Commons initiative] protocol, Creative Commons restates the problem that copyright simply does not apply universally to factual information." Then there's an update on Nestoria, the first commercial application now using exclusively OSM data. We also have Google's Ed Parsons discussing the differences between data in Google Maps and OpenStreetMap. Other OSM entries include a short discussion on the community surrounding OSM vs "old timers", a mention of OSM during the KDE 4 keynote, a visual comparison of Google data vs OSM + OpenAerialMap data over China, a short account of using JOSM, the advanced OpenStreetMap editor, and finally, the announcement of this year's State of the Map 2008 conference will be held in Ireland. See also the numerous related stories below (more if you search the Slashgeo archives). On a personal note, I used to say about OSM that data is particularly useful in Europe, but not in North America yet... after a quick peak today at the status of OSM completion in NA, I admit I'm impressed, data has been added very rapidly and this is obviously great news for public domain data.

When I show OpenStreetMap to friends and colleagues, I systematically talk about its coverage in Baghdad. Ogle Earth just did a comparison of the major webmapping sites specifically for Baghdad with screenshots. As much as OpenStreetMap is surprisingly great in some areas, a user comment reminds us it varies a great deal on the location, such as in this Turkish region: Live, Google, Yahoo, OpenStreetMap. See also related stories below.

The OSGeo-Discuss mailing list made me aware of the ongoing efforts to import the Government of Canada's geodata directly in OpenStreetMap. Needless to say, this would suddenly greatly enhance Canada's geodata in OpenStreetMap. From the wiki: "The October OpenStreetMap Foundation meeting was held Tuesday 28 October 2008. The encouragement of GeoBase and their enthusiasm for OpenStreetMap led to their legal analysis of the licenses and a finding of compatibility. It was proposed that the GeoBase data be included in OSM based on the license compatibility and the aligned GeoBase and OpenStreetMap goals of providing free geospatial data to as wide an audience as possible. The proposal was passed by the board. The OpenStreetMap community, the OSM Foundation and particularly Canadian contributors to the OpenStreetMap community have anticipated this announcement for some time. I'm sure that you will all join me in thanking GeoBase, the Foundation and the Canadian points of contact for their patience, persistence and vision. Scope: The importance of this announcement is hard to over-state. The agreement between GeoBase and OpenStreetMap marks the contribution of government data from the second largest country on the planet, the largest country in the western hemisphere and the country with the longest coastline on the planet. The GeoBase data set is rich and diverse including the National Road Network, National Hydro Network (surface water), Geopolitical Boundaries, Elevation data and Satellite imagery. The scope of this contribution is unlikely to be surpassed in geographic area." See also related stories below and our full OpenStreetMap coverage here. In other recent OpenStreetMap geonews, TMR links to a TechCrunch article about the growth of OpenStreetMap.

The OSGeo-Geodata mailing list was amongst the sources indicating the U.S. Census Bureau released this week the 2008 TIGER/Line shapefiles. From the site: "The TIGER/Line Shapefiles are extracts containing selected geographic and cartographic information from the Census Bureau's MAF/TIGER® (Master Address File / Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing) database. The MAF/TIGER database was developed at the Census Bureau to support a variety of geographic programs and operations including functions such as mapping, geocoding, and geographic reference files that are used in decennial and economic censuses and sample survey programs. Spatial data for geographic features such as roads, railroads, rivers, and lakes, as well as legal and statistical geographic areas are included in the product. Other information about these features, such as the name, the type of feature, address ranges, and the geographic relationship to other features, also are included. The TIGER/Line Shapefiles are made available to the public for no charge and are typically used to provide the digital map base for a Geographic Information System or for mapping software." See also previous stories below.

Off The Map offers an interesting entry on worldwide comparison of OpenStreetMap vs TeleAtlas street coverage­. From the entry: "Alex’s original assessment was that OSM is slightly ahead of Google/TeleAtlas worldwide and in in Africa and Asia. In Europe, OSM is well ahead. Google is slightly ahead in Oceania, and well ahead in North and especially South America." See also previous related stories below or use a search.

The OpenGeoData blog has an informative entry named surveying OpenStreetMap in Africa. From the entry: "OpenStreetMap is growing rapidly across all of Africa. Mapping is spreading through local mappers, mappers on vacation, foreign nationals, and remote mapping using satellite imagery. A recent comparison judged that OSM had the most comprehensive coverage of Africa among web mapping services, especially in cities. [...] The OpenStreetMap Foundation will be distributing donated GPS units to mappers in developing countries. Not yet formally announced, the codenamed “Mappers Without Borders” project will be providing OSM mapping assistance to humanitarian response and development projects, particularly in Africa. (As a still informal entity, we’ve recently been active in mapping the Gaza Strip.)" See also previous stories below.