Science Library Pad

Nanaimo in Google Earth highres

Have you ever wondered what the view is like from the rooftop of the Beacon Tower in Nanaimo, B.C.?

Would you like to know if there is a man selling hot dogs at the corner of Commercial and Wharf Streets in the Vancouver Island city's picturesque downtown?

Visitors to Google Earth can inspect almost every square centimetre of the city of 80,000, which has become the world's most active supplier of geographic data to the mapping search engine service from the U.S. portal site.

...

these days 10 centimetres on the ground in Nanaimo equals one pixel on Google Earth – significantly higher resolution than maps covering the rest of the world.

Globe and Mail - Visitors to Google Earth put Nanaimo on map - August 6, 2007

in the age of geoinformation

You may wonder what interests me about automated geotagging of photos using a GPS.
There are a couple things.
One is that I can see the tracks of where I've walked (or ridden on the train, or flown).
The other is that I can learn more about what I photographed.

I'm walking around Paris, I see a church with a motto GLORIA DEO * PAX TERRAE

That's cool.  Snap a photo.

I have no idea what church it is.

Get home, georeference it automatically, and now I'm in Google Earth

So that's cool, now I know where I was, and I can see the beautiful cross-shape of the church.
But what church?
Turn on Geographic Web... no help.
Turn on Google Earth Community... aha!

It's the E‰glise Saint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet (website, Wikipedia).

In a sense, physical objects can now tell you about themselves, as in Vinge's Rainbows End.

But it's quite a delayed process.
What I should be able to do is load my phone or camera's multi-gig memory up with map info (or download live info, if I didn't have outrageous data charges) and do this in real time.  But unfortunately Google Maps Mobile seems to have no concept of running as a nice generic Java mobile app that can talk to my GPS (e.g. on my K790 phone using Bluetooth GPS), Google Maps Mobile instead is all locked up with specific carriers and phones, and I don't think it will let you download maps in advance.  j2memap for some reason only pulls in satellite views, not street name views or enhanced geographic info.  Hmm, if only I had a chance to talk to someone at Google...

(This posting for Colin, geothinking author.)

More info and thoughts along these lines in my Mapping category and on my geocoding photos page.

georeferenced crowdsourcing network - Ogle Earth speculates

Daily Wireless excerpts a Newsweek article that struck me: Both Tele Atlas and competitor NAVTEQ already employ hundreds of "road warriors" in the field to gather data that satellites can't catch: traffic signs, one-way streets, points of interest...

"At the end of the day, there's no substitute for going out there and capturing the real world ourselves," says Navteq CEO Judson Green.

How to scale that? Build a crowdsourcing network, so that others can capture the real world for you — using devices that companies like TomTom (and Garmin, and Nokia) can build.

Geospatial crowdsourcing already has a impressive working example: OpenStreetMap.org, where you can (manually) upload your own GPS tracks to create a collective world road map or edit existing data. And now it turns out that Google has been piloting something similar in India

...

This is where this week's under-reported acquisition plays a part: Nokia bought Twango. Twango is a media sharing web application for mobile devices. Unlike its main competitor Shozu, which offers to forward your media to your web sharing app of choice (such as YouTube, Flickr and others), Twango wants you to store all your media in one place, on its servers, and share it using its URLs as a destination. With Twango soon installed by default on new Nokias mobiles, Nokia will be making a play to capture the generated media of its hundreds of millions of mobile phone users, so that network effects are its to dispense — with uploaded videos and photos providing eyeballs to advertisers.

from Ogle Earth - The human sensor web

UPDATE: Via Map Room I see there was also a recent New York Times article With Tools on Web, Amateurs Reshape Mapmaking

On the Web, anyone can be a mapmaker.

With the help of simple tools introduced by Internet companies recently, millions of people are trying their hand at cartography, drawing on digital maps and annotating them with text, images, sound and videos.

the New York Times also gets it wrong on photo geocoding

The Nikon D2X, the company’s current top-of-the-line SLR model ($5,100), works with an optional MC-35 GPS Adapter cord ($139) that connects with a standard G.P.S. receiver (which you must also buy) to automatically save location coordinates with each photograph.

But G.P.S. is starting to show up among lower-priced cameras. The new Ricoh 500SE (about $1,000), a point-and-shoot model aimed at outdoor enthusiasts, has a built-in G.P.S. device. It’s even showing up on camera phones, including the Nokia N95, though the $749 price is still a bit steep.

New York Times - Snapshots That Do More Than Bore Friends - June 10, 2007

via EveryTrail Blog

Yes, to be fair, in various places I have written about or linked to these high-end products, but I have also tried repeatedly to emphasize that for those of us without thousands of dollars to spare you can accomplish great automatic photo geocoding with a $100 GPS logger.  I think maybe I need to emphasize that point more.

Previously:
June 28, 2007  Wired gets it wrong on geocoding photos

news video on photo geocoding

CBS 5 KPIX San Francisco has a video report on photo geocoding (there's a brief ad at the beginning).

via EveryTrail Blog

Wired gets it wrong on geocoding photos

Wired's otherwise admirable piece on Google Maps/Earth

Google Maps Is Changing the Way We See the World

has this oddly misleading sidebar:

Pinpointed Photography

Organizing vacation pics would be so much easier if you could remember exactly where you took each one. The Ricoh 500SE can help: This 8-megapixel digicam comes with a built-in GPS receiver that notes longitude and latitude in the file every time you fire up the shutter. (Programs like Google Maps can decode them.) Not ready to drop $1,100? Try a lower-tech workaround: Follow your photos with snapshots of the readout from a cheap GPS unit and type in the coordinates later as tags on Flickr. As GPS becomes more of a must-have feature, you'll see this kind of kung fu embedded in all your gadgets. Imagine checking your computer to see exactly where you left your glasses.

Now I know sidebars can never fit in all you want, but giving as the two options a $1000 camera and a manual process seem to have left out a more practical middle ground, the one I use: a $100 GPS logger plus some software.  See my geocoding photos page for more info.

Maybe I should take Polaroids and stick them on a map with pushpins and string, a la Heros.
Actually, come to think of it, that would be kind of cool.

EXPIRED - Writing photo location in pen on the back of the print

TIRED - Typing coordinates into Flickr

WIRED - automatic geocoding with inexpensive GPS loggers and timestamp matching

geocoded photos now in PicasaWeb

PicasaWeb, the Google web photo gallery, has now got improved metadata features, including supporting geocoded photos (although it is not clear from their blog posting, it will read the EXIF-GPS for the exact location, if available).

See e.g. a photo I took in Regent's Park

http://picasaweb.google.com/scilib/2007_06_19/photo#map

There is also a one-click link to view the photos in Google Earth.

via Flickr Geotagging group

If you want more info about this topic, I have a page on geocoding photos.

A couple notes:

• you can upload to PicasaWeb directly from inside Picasa
• You can manually geocode from within Picasa and PicasaWeb

GPS on a plane

This is what my day was like

This is real data from my GPS logger, it's not just a path that I've drawn.

Here's the KMZ

Download FlyingParisOttawa-no-alt.kmz

I haven't got the altitude data out, but I'll work on it.  Unfortunately, the logger was not set to record altitude (it's a configuration option).

More info to come in this posting in a few days, once I'm say, not at the end of 16 hours of travel or whatever.

UPDATE 2007-06-25: I used the DG-100 GPS logger (SIRFstar III).  I turned it on when boarding the planes, I had window seats.  I just had it on my leg (which was not so clever, as it fell off onto the floor twice).  In the seat pocket would probably also work.  That's it, it acquired signal normally and maintained it without any problems.  The above track has some gap-fill artificial data over Newfoundland as the battery ran low and I had to recharge the DG-100 from my laptop for an hour or so.  While recharging the Air Canada staff asked what it was and when I told them it was a GPS, they checked and verified that it was ok.

In case it's not clear, it's not live data captured directly within Google Earth.  That should in theory be possible, although without a net connection you would need to pre-visit places to get them in Google Earth cache I think.  The above track was stored on the logger and then converted for Google Earth using GPS Visualizer.

The DG-100 is not a Bluetooth logger; it's self-contained (for Bluetooth, check the airline policies, and you almost certainly can't turn it on until the seatbelt light is off).  I'm pretty sure SAS permits Bluetooth; I don't know about other airlines.

There are two separate flights in the track: first BA from Paris to London, and then changed planes to AirCan from London to Ottawa.

shop local using GPS product locations

In a previous posting, I said

It is a bit unfortunate, I think, that it is easier to discover and buy stuff from across the entire continent (say in my case, to buy stuff from California and have it shipped to Ottawa) than it is to quickly locate items in stores a block or two away from my house.

There is now a GPS-based service available

Sprint users can take advantage of the new Slifter powered by GPS. You don't even need to know where you are in order to find the stuff you want at local stores. Combining Sprint's powerful nation-wide GPS System with Slifter's database of over 85 Million products...

This is good-ish I guess.  I still don't quite get the idea of the mobile device as the command centre for your life.  If I want to buy something, I go to my computer with the keyboard and the giant screen and the fast Internet connection, I don't dodge in and out of traffic while trying to type something with a phone keyboard in order to pay some outrageous data rate to get a dribble of information back.

Fortunately regular Slifter provides online local product search, unfortunately it is US-only.

JetBlue airline seatback Google Maps and photo contest

JetBlue Airways Corporation (Nasdaq:JBLU) today announces a partnership with Google Maps to provide customers with a real-time flight tracking channel on its signature seatback televisions to map the aircraft's route. To celebrate, the low-fare, high-frills airline is launching a "JetBlue Point of View" photo contest(a), inviting customers to share their own summer travel routes on a Google Maps mash-up on www.jetblue.com/google

...

The moving map feature will be located on channel 13 of JetBlue's in-seat satellite television system, provided by LiveTV. In addition to in-flight tracking, customers can also refer their friends, family and loved ones to www.jetblue.com, where their flights can be tracked live using Google's technology online, including the flight's estimated departure and arrival times.

investor.jetblue.com - JetBlue Airways Announces Partnership With Google Maps to Provide Real-Time Flight Tracking Feature

how to enter:

       1. Take photos from the window of any JetBlue flight (when advised by your Inflight Crew that it’s okay to use electronic devices) between June 4 and September 3 [2007]. Please amateur photographers only

(residents of the continental US only)

I always feel a bit awkward taking photos through my airplane window, like I'm breaking some rule - this is the first time I've heard of an airline specifically requesting it.  I'd really like to capture some GPS tracks on a plane as well, but I always imagine trying to explain to the airplane staff something like "I'm holding this small plastic box with flashing LEDs up to the fragile window of the plane to communicate with satellites in order to determine our exact position" and I can never come up with a scenario in which it turns out well.

via gadling
via Digg

Yahoo Home Values - an example of combining APIs

Why do you want to have an ecosystem of services?
So that developers can do stuff like this.

Yahoo Real Estate's new Home Values page. Launched this morning, the new page combines three APIs available right here on the Developer Network with two more from Zillow, to provide a 360-degree view of what homes are worth in the neighborhood of your choice.

Yahoo! APIs In Use:

    * AJAX Maps - finds the home you're searching for, recently sold comparables, and nearby similar homes for sale.
    * Local Search - finds and displays local appraisers and customer ratings.
    * Answers Question Search - finds and displays questions and answers for the query "home value."

Zillow APIs In Use:

    * GetDeepSearchResults - finds valuations, home data, sales and tax records.
    * GetDeepComps - gets data on comparable homes in the area.

Covers homes in USA only.

Flickr directly to Google Earth, using KML network link

Flickr has a new &format=kml_nl option, which generates a network link that Google Earth can read to display the selected photos.

Here's an example for my feed, photos taken in France

http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/geo/france/?id=48889071218@N01&format=kml_nl

and photos taken in Paris

http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/geo/fr/paris/?id=48889071218@N01&format=kml_nl

There's detailed information at

http://geobloggers.com/archives/2007/05/31/flickr-kml-and-a-stroll-down-memory-lane/

via discussion group Geotagging Flickr

GeoCommons goes live

You can upload KMZ files, describe data elements, and then create maps.

You cannot, as far as I can tell, directly use external data sources (e.g. GeoRSS).

http://www.geocommons.com/

Previously:
December 13, 2006  FortiusOne open geodata mapping

library conferences on a map

It seems to me it would take such a thin layer of widely-used microformats to be able to plot library conferences on a timeline and on a map, but for now the reality is conferences tend to be listed on static, hand-created web pages, all with widely-differing formats, and every single conference has its own static, custom web site.

It's therefore fairly remarkable that Google is able to make anything at all out of this mess, in order to plot a few library conferences on a US map

From Google experimental search

library conferences view:map

http://www.google.com/views?q=library+conferences+view%3Amap

Google Earth and environmental sciences

Presentations are now available from Google Earth and other geobrowsing tools in the environmental sciences, a workshop held April 2-3, 2007 by the UK National Institute for Environmental eScience (NIEeS).

via Declan Butler

UPDATE 2007-05-08: NIEES tells me the archives are currently unavailable, they're working to fix the problem. 

2nd UPDATE: The presentations are available again.

dg-100 gps logger review and comparison

[This information is from 2007.  For the latest information on GPS loggers, please see my other blog, Richard's Tech Reviews.]

Summary: I would recommend the Globalsat DG-100 GPS data logger for Windows users who are fairly comfortable using computers (it's not yet Mac compatible - see below).  The software is a bit more complex to use than Sony's, so it may not be good for novice or inexpert computer users, but it offers many more features.  The Globalsat software does not offer photo geocoding, only location download and mapping; you will need additional software to map your photos.

In Canada, I ordered my DG-100 for US$90 from US store Semsons.com, it included an extra USB charger.

In the United States, you can buy the Globalsat DG-100 GPS data logger from Amazon.com.

UPDATE 2007-11-20: I have reviewed the Qstarz BT-Q1000 GPS logger and Bluetooth GPS with MTK 32 channels/32 hours battery life and other than some software issues of its own, I like it better than the DG-100.  ENDUPDATE

UPDATE 2007-11-23: Work is underway to access the DG-100 from a Mac, see my posting GPS loggers and Macs for more info.  Also note there are Windows software alternatives for downloading from the Globalsat - some are mentioned in the comments.  ENDUPDATE

Comparison Chart:

Globalsat DG-100 Sony GPS-CS1 sensor 20 channel SIRFstar III 12 channel (unknown type) * # of location points stored ** 60000 "360 hours of positions" (about 86400 track points) memory 31MB position interval user configured every 15 seconds battery 2 AA 1 AA battery life ** 20 hours 10 to 14 hours USB built-in external cable (included) recharge over USB? yes no mount as storage device? no yes GPS-mouse mode? yes no Bluetooth no no external antenna jack? yes (MMCX) no multiple logging modes? yes no user-configurable logging modes? yes no software included yes (download and map only, no photo features) yes compatibility Windows only Windows, Mac (Intel OS X 10.4.9) log format GSD (Globalsat format) NMEA

* I assume the Sony is SIRFstar II, but it is not documented anywhere

** Based on various (slightly inconsistent) manufacturer-supplied information.  Globalsat info from manual version 1.1

Above: Sony GPS-CS1 on left, Globalsat DG-100 in centre.

A note about GPS

I have realized that not everyone understands how GPS works and what its limitations are.

In brief, you need a clear sky view, so that the GPS can talk to enough satellites to figure out its position.  Basically the way I think of it is that if you can see a good patch of clear sky, so can your GPS.  This means if you're surrounded by tall buildings, or in a building, or underground, you won't get a GPS fix.

So it's not like a cellphone where you still get a good signal inside a building.

If you have the GPS right in a car window (or a train window) you should be able to get a fix.  I have yet to get a location fix in an airplane.  UPDATE 2007-07-03: Also I got good GPS data sitting in window seats on two different planes.  ENDUPDATE

On the plus side, GPS will work through fabric, I usually have mine in an outside pocket of an MEC shoulder bag, or in a shirt pocket, it would also work in an outer pocket of a backpack, or probably in a purse.

As conditions get worse, e.g. from low-rise houses to skyscrapers, it gets harder for the GPS to get a good signal.

Basically, for a GPS data logger, you should turn it off any time you're going inside a building, or going in the metro etc.  Otherwise it will start logging increasingly incorrect position information, as it tries with escalating difficulty to guess your position.  (On e.g. a Google Earth track display, this usually shows as a big child-like spiky scribble indicating a cloud of incorrect positions many metres wide.)

What's the Point?

I use my GPS data loggers to automatically geocode photos, indicating the position where they were taken for display on Google/Yahoo maps and Google Earth.  (Most typically, via the built-in Flickr maps capability.)  Mostly I am taking photos in cities, which are a fairly challenging environment due to the buildings (more so in US or other skyscraper cities than in the lower six-storey typical European cities).  As extremely detailed satellite images are now available of many cities, it's nice to be within a few metres of the location you actually took the photo, and with a good logger (and the time properly set on your camera) this is possible.

SIRFstar II vs SIRFstar III

I am not an expert, but basically my understanding is S3 is a more senstive chip set.  In my practical experience, S3 gives much better results in challenging city environments than S2.

Details

I already have a Sony GPS-CS1 (see previous review) but I wanted to see if a better product was available.  After reading a good review at GPS Passion, I got the Globasat DG-100.  I am very pleased.  It has many advantages for me:

- it comes with rechargeable batteries that charge automatically over USB

- it has a built-in (albeit very short) USB cable

- it has a better chipset (more accurate positions in challenging city environments)

Above: what comes in the package.

Above: size comparison with Sony GPS data logger, also shows DG-100 with battery cover off.

With the Sony, absent an external battery charger I would have to buy, I have to take many batteries with me (I usually figure on a battery for every two or three days).  This is a hassle and not very enviro-friendly.  Unlike the Sony, the Globalsat charges over USB, so you can plug it into a laptop, or if you're not carrying around a laptop, you can get a USB wall-jack adapter for charging.

I have to strongly warn you that the Globalsat software is extremely non-intuitive.  With the Sony there is some basic software, or you can just grab files off the device mounted as a file system, and then use the files in anything that can read NMEA logs.  With Globalsat, you must use the software even just to access the data logs.  The data logs for some reason are chunked into 95 data point sections, which makes working with them a hassle.  The easiest thing is to merge the files you want (e.g., a day's worth of position logs) and then export them as GPX to use in other applications, such as GPS Visualizer.

In order to do this (assuming you have already installed the necessary drivers from the CD):

1. If you don't have it already, download the latest software from e.g. Globalsat Taiwan support

http://www.globalsat.com.tw/eng/product_detail2_00000090.htm

(you must have the 2007-03-15 version or newer for GPX export to work properly)

2. Connect the DG-100 and power it on

3. Start the "Data Logger PC Utility"

4. TrackRecord->Load Track Points...

5. Select (checkmark) the files you want to Load.  Unless you want every data point from every day available on the data logger, don't select all at this point.

6. Once they are downloaded ("Receive Track points OK") select File->Select All Files

7. Here is the most confusing part: To merge the files, select Map->View Point

(Note: this is explained in the manual, but is tremendously counter-intuitive)

Wait while the data points are consolidated (it may take some time, even on a fast machine).

8. You can now export the merged file to many formats, I use File->Export->GPX...

9. If you want, you can also use the built-in capability to display the points on a Google Map (Map->Show Track Points in Google Map) which is displayed within the Data Logger Utility interface, or use Map->Google Earth to send them to Google Earth (which of course you must have installed first)

User-configurable Logging Modes

There is a switch on the side that lets you choose one of three user-defined logging modes (A, B, C).  The device comes preconfigured for walking, biking, and driving.  The modes determine how often data points are logged, amongst other things.  Of course, you actually have to remember to switch the switch when you change transportation in order to take advantage of this.

NOTE: If you want to log altitude, you will have to set this in Settings->Configuration...
I don't think altitude logging is enabled by default.

Comparison of Globalsat SIRFstar III and Sony GPS-CS1 Tracks

As I indicated, Sony doesn't say what chipset they are using, but as it is 12 channel, it's probably SIRFstar II.  Upgrading this would be the biggest single improvement Sony could make to their device.  As it is, the Sony can be off by several metres.  For example, here are tracks of me on a boat tour on the Seine (yeah I know, rough life).  The Globalsat track in cyan correctly shows the boat tracking in the middle of the river.  The Sony GPS log in orange is so far off that it looks like it is going along the bank of the river, or briefly along a bridge at one point.

More on Track Display and Geocoding

For me, I usually use GPS Visualizer to take GPX format tracks and turn them into Google Earth format displays, it can do more advanced things like make time-based tracks.

For photo geocoding, I use RoboGEO, see a previous posting with some info.

successfully geocoded photos

I have to write this down immediately because the steps are rather more complex than I would like, and I'm likely to forget them again.

1. Download photos from camera
2. Download GPS tracks

2a. Connect GPS logger via USB
2b. Power ON Globalsat GPS logger

(I will have more to say about my new GPS logger in a future posting.)  UPDATE 2007-05-06: See my review of the Globalsat DG-100 GPS data logger for more info.  ENDUPDATE

In my case, use latest version of GS Data Logger Utility S-0PC-0L-07031401 (I downloaded it from the support site).

then

(download all the files TrackRecord->Load Track Points... )

Once you have them all

File->Select All Files
Map->View Point (wait for them all to be processed, it may take a while)
File->Export->GPX File...

3. Determine GMT and camera offsets

Note: RoboGEO measures GMT offsets in minutes GMT is AHEAD of your local time
(the opposite of the way timezones are usually measured)
and camera time error offset in seconds. 

I had of course forgotten to set my camera time, so it was in my local and was a minute slow

4. Set RoboGEO prefs accordingly

File->Preferences->Common Settings

CameraOffset -60 [save]
UtcTimeBias +240 [save] (camera was set to Eastern time zone, GMT-4, so GMT is four hours ahead)

This time setting is so confusing that I am just going to set my camera to accurate UTC in the future.
(I will have more to say about time in a later posting.)

If you're wondering if a minute matters (the camera time offset), the answer is very much yes.  A minute (even when walking) is a very visible difference in location accuracy (basically without this correction, my photos would all be placed several meters behind the actual location they were taken).

4. Load and process in RoboGEO

4a. Select directory with images (Step #1 "Select an entire folder")
4b. Since it's a GPX file, load as tracklog (Step #2 "From a tracklog file")

5. Verify positions in Google Earth from RoboGEO

Step #3 "Export to Google Earth"

Note: RoboGEO does not auto-rotate images (taken in portrait mode 90 degrees), which kinda sucks in terms of Google Earth display for those images.

6. Once positions are verified, write to EXIF from RoboGEO

Step #3 "Write the location data to the EXIF headers"

whew

Just for completeness, if you want to upload to Flickr and have the (now EXIF location stamped) photos automatically mapped, make sure you set

http://www.flickr.com/account/geo/exif

BEFORE you upload, and DO NOT resize using the uploader (it will lose the EXIF location data if you do).

For more info, see my permanent reference page on geocoding photos.

GeoRSS makes Flickr photos in Google maps easy

Standard data formats enable powerful interoperability.
For example, Google's new support for GeoRSS means that (if you have already geocoded your photos in Flickr), you can easily plot your photo feed on a Google Map

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_public.gne%3Fid%3D48889071218%40N01%26format%3Drss_200%26georss%3Dtrue&layer=&ie=UTF8&z=7&om=1&iwloc=G

Simply locate the feed link on your Flickr page, e.g.

Feed – Subscribe to rakerman's photos

copy the link, add &georss=true on the end, and paste it into the Google Maps search box.

via MAKE - GeoRSS with Google and MyMaps...

Here's what it looks like

Google MyMaps

Tonight Google launched MyMaps. It adds the ability to create and share maps directly from Google's site .... These maps will be added to Google geoindex and will be available to search in Google Earth and in Local Search. These maps will be syndicated via KML; support for GeoRSS syndication is coming (not surprising given that GeoRSS can be consumed by these maps - Radar post). Users are able to create their own maps and mark them public or private. The annotation tools that are provided are very simple and easy to use.

O'Reilly Radar - Google Launches MyMaps

UPDATE 2007-04-17: From my perspective, this is a fairly thin layer of additional functionality.  I do all my placemarks in Google Earth - I don't see any advantage to doing them in My Maps.  It's maybe not widely known, but Google Maps could already read Google Earth KMZ files - just enter the URL of the .kmz in the search box of Google Maps. 

There doesn't seem to be any way to directly import a KMZ in My Maps, but you can import placemarks one-by-one using "Save to My Maps".

cool geobooking and pat on the head from Google

Via Google Earth Blog I find Google Lit Trips.

This site is an experiment in teaching great literature in a very different way. Using Google Earth, students discover where in the world the greatest ... stories of all time took place

Very cool, although I suspect it's done manually, which is not so efficient.

I was a bit surprised to see a "Google Certified Teacher" logo.

If you've been reading my blog, you know my opinion on certifications of any kind, if not, here it is:

Certifications are bullshit.

On top of that, I find the idea of Google certifying teachers incredibly condescending.  Sure, you have a Bachelor's and a Master's in Education, and years of skills in getting a bunch of jittery kids to actually learn something, but hey, what use is that?  No, now you can spend some time (mostly on your own dime, it looks like) learning how to create placemarks in Google Earth and finally You've Come A Long Way Baby, you're Google Certified™®.

map and gps mashups in InfoWeek

The March 17, 2007 InformationWeek has a fairly extensive article with sidebars, Maps Meet Mashups.

among the hottest and most useful new generation of applications on the Web--the location mashup.

More than 35,000 location mashups--ranging from restaurant locators to celebrity trackers--have been created using Google Maps alone.

I was interested by their sidebar GPS Mashups Are Going Nowhere.

Wireless carriers generally don't share the information generated by a phone's GPS chip--a user's longitude and latitude, in particular--or other network data that might be used to pinpoint a phone's location. Just getting GPS data can be difficult if not impossible for would-be mashup makers.

Well, yes but.  While most phones don't have accessible GPS, newer phones with Bluetooth and good Java support can talk to an external GPS.  However, it's certainly true that the cell providers are killing this in multiple ways:

• limiting access to internal phone location information
• limiting ability to run third-party apps on the phone
• outrageously expensive Internet data charges
• trying to lock users into the provider's special (and extra cost, always extra cost) GPS mapping offering

I found lots of GPS mapping applications I'd like to try on my Sony K790 using a Bluetooth external GPS:

del.icio.us/scilibfurl/mapping+cellphone

but let's check last month's Internet data bill (most of it before I turned on the very slightly better data plan)

Yes, that's right, 4 MEGAbytes for over $200.  That's megabytes folks, you know, the little things that fit 1000 at a time onto the 1 gig memory sticks scattered in your desk drawers.  Four 3.5" floppy disks worth of data for $200.  Back to the Future!  Except if floppies had cost $25 each.

But not to worry, Rogers has Telenav Navigator!  Except not for my phone.  Oh, and it will cost $10 a month.  If I'm reading it right, that's $10 a month PLUS the data charges.  Because you know, 5 cents or 3 cents per kilobyte wouldn't be enough, they had to tack an extra ten bucks on.

So while I may try some mapping apps, they're going to be ones that use locally pre-loaded maps (e.g. on the phone's memory stick) and that never, ever connect to the Internet.

wireless barometer: sell your location

Via Semsons I find this interesting project: The InCode Wireless Barometer $100 GPS data offer.

In brief, as you go about your daily business with your cellphone, you run an app that talks to a GPS, recording the cellphone signal strength and current location.  InCode uses this to build detailed maps of cellphone performance.  They are paying $25 per 10,000 GPS data points, up to a maximum of $100.

I have to say this seems a bit cheap for having a complete track of my location day by day.  They say 10,000 data points is about a month's worth, I would have thought (logging every 15 seconds, 8 hours a day) that it would be more like a week's worth.

It is certainly an interesting idea, if you don't mind selling your location.  What you get in return (beyond the cash), if I understand correctly, is free maps on your cellphone.

If I were Tapscott, I suppose I would wax lyrical about this being prosumer wikinomic business outsourcing or something.

On a related note, the 2007 Where Conference (I refuse to add "2.0" to it) will be this May 29-30 in San Jose, California.

Note: InCode was bought by Verizon late last year.

IATUL 2007 - Google Earth

I have done a Google Earth KMZ of the IATUL 2007 hotel options and venue.

Download IATUL2007.kmz

UPDATE 2007-06-09: I have done a new version that adds the conference halls and the central train station.

Download IATUL2007v2.kmz

open Canadian geodata

In response to demands from users for no fee access to framework geographic data and the increasing technological shift in the marketplace, Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), is pleased to announce that starting April 1st 2007, the Earth Sciences Sector (ESS) will change the way its Digital Topographic Data (DTD) can be accessed. ESS will initiate a change from a cost recovery environment to an environment providing no fee access to its current DTD products.

via The Map Room - Government of Canada Frees Topo Data

more geobooking from Google

I love these book data visualizations.

Inside Google Book Search - Earth viewed from books

As I've said before, I can imagine such a tremendous discovery power coming from unlocking the data in books and visualising and linking it all.

via Darren Barefoot

Previously:
January 29, 2007  Google geobooking