A look at Manifold 6.5

Dave Brubacher of GeoReference.org has just released a short review of Manifold 6.5. FYI, georeference.org is a dedicated resource for the Manifold user community. Dave cites speed as being the biggest thing coming at 6.5. He also takes a closer look at tables and queries

 

Geographers get a chance to go to Galapagos

I know this isn't exactly GIS news, however, some budding GIS professionals and geographers now have a chance to win a great escape courtesy of National Geographic. Fifteen kids submitting entries that the judges believe best meet the judging criteria, including demonstrating a passion to explore, will be selected for the inaugural National Geographic kids' expedition team and will take the ultimate field trip on board a Lindblad Expedition ship, accompanied by a National Geographic explorer and other experts.

The Everyday Explorer Challenge runs through Oct. 31. Students should explore their local communities, take a picture of a place they discover or like to explore, and write a 100- to 200-word essay describing how they actively explore their community and the most interesting things they have found. They can write about the things they find in their backyards or gardens, on their street, at the park or zoo, in the woods, in the local creek or pond -- anywhere in their communities. The contest is open to kids who will be between the ages of 9 and 14 during the Galapagos expedition (scheduled for May 13-22, 2006). A panel of National Geographic experts will select the 15 winners.

Each winner will bring a parent or guardian on the expedition. No purchase is necessary to enter the contest. Complete rules and details can be found online at http://www.everydayexplorer.com/.

Google Moon!

In honor of the first manned Moon landing, which took place on July 20, 1969, the folks at Google have added some NASA imagery to the Google Maps interface to help you pay your own visit to our celestial neighbor. Make sure you zoom right in for some interesting detail!  http://moon.google.com/

gmaptrack, mapping bloggers with Google's API

I came across an interesting resource today from http://www.gmaptrack.com/ (actually I think I saw it previously but didn't really look into it too deep). They've done a decent job at tracking their friends blogs (see http://www.gmaptrack.com/map/iframe/787/1516). The resource boasts the following... "It is currently in beta, with the intention of showing the possibilities of Google Maps integration." Users can add locations and pin-points, plot trips, and in the future, real-time tracking using GPS (this has already been done elsewhere but its cool to see what people can come up with)... nice stuff!

Sample legal cases over public access to GIS data in Florida

Some interesting public records are available in Florida that pertain to
the ongoing battle of Joe Public attempting to gain access to GIS data.
These 2 cases are good examples of the ongoing battle.

AGO 2003-042 - Palm Beach County - (Attorney General's Opinion) states
the following... "these materials have been produced using public funds
and, by law, are available to the public at the cost of copying without
regard to the purposes for which the information is to be used."

After several months of legal battle, the Attorney General ruled in
favor of the plaintiff and now as a result users can obtain the same
parcel shapefiles for free from the Palm Beach County's FTP site. For
details see
http://myfloridalegal.com/ago.nsf/aaee37715760bbce852563cc001bacf7/26395
79ab297311d85256d970046709f!OpenDocument

Florida Second District Court of Appeals Case No. 2D03-3346 - In a
similar decision Microdecisions, Inc. et al fought the Collier County's
Property Appraiser. Microdecisions, Inc won the case which should
provide a precedent for similar action in the State.

See http://www.2dca.org/opinion/December%2001,%202004/2D03-3346.pdf

Google Earth Real-estate apps... unlicensed access to licensed imagery?

More on Google Earth... with all the Google Map and now Google Earth "hacks" popping up you  have to ask yourself, is this slick geospatial viewing tool much more than simply a viewer, and even more so, is it a very clever way to access and integrate licensed data and imagery within your own custom application without having to license the data?

Google will tell you that Earth is bringing geospatial data to the mainstream user's desktop.. no question there. But I simply can't figure out how clever users such as those at Prudential Chicago are legally allowed to serve up a custom real estate search application, with high-res imagery, and get away without paying licensing fees for the data... doesn't everyone else have to pay for that data? There's this implied vision that Earth and all the imagery available on the users' desktop is free and without restriction. Naturally there's an agreement that one must accept before installing and running Earth, however, that doesn't seem to be slowing down programmers who are eagerly creating applications. As an example, Prudential launched their Chicago real estate search application just 3 days after Google Earth was officially made available. The crew at Prudential had apparently been working on a browser plug-in so that when a user opens their browser they would get a list of properties. When Google Earth launched June 28 they saw their chance and quickly designed the modification and created the Google Earth app.