Dear Friends , I just got this from another list and even when this topic has been discussed here I thought this may be of your interest.
¡Saludos! / Greetings! Juan José Del Toro Madrueño [EMAIL PROTECTED] Guadalajara, Jalisco MEXICO 01-33-3171-0896 MSN [EMAIL PROTECTED] Skype jdeltoro1973 N 20° 40 33.95" W 103° 26 39.47" > Dear Google > > Thanks indeed for officially opening APIs to Google maps. Based on the > volume of creativity unleashed as a result, this was clearly a great > idea. Thanks too, for, the public release of Google Earth, which has > provoked an unprecedented interest in computational models of the earth. > > Unfortunately there has been some inadvertant damage as a result of > both of these otherwise well intentioned moves. Just as it is > impossible to walk across a lawn without stepping on micro-organisms, > Google, becuase of it's size is having a potentially crushing impact > on a wide number of grass roots and open source geospatial computing > projects in two major categories, first in social mapping and locative > media, there have been a wide number of grass roots efforts underway > for the last few years, that, as a result of the publication of > O'Reilly's new Mapping Hacks book, many of these projects seemed at > the cusp of gathering a critical mass of support from the creative, > and open source programming communities. Among too-many projects to > list here, openguides, civicmaps, worldkit, pointmapper, and openstreetmaps are fine examples. > Now instead of trying out some amazing new open map hacks, many > newcomers to geospatial computing are scraping google javascripts. > Second, Ever since White House initiatives initiatied by Vice > President Al Gore, there has been an enormous, mostly volunteer effort > for over 10 years to create a substantial infrastucture for an new > interoperable, planet-wide geographic information system baased on a > suite of open standards for exchanging geographic data including WMS ( > Web Map Server, WFS ( Web Feature Server) and GML, Geographic Markup > language. There are many notable projects including Mapserver, Geoserver, uDig, Worldwind. > > The combination of grass-roots spatial hypermedia, and opensource > mapping might well lead to a new ecosytem of services, sometimes > called a geospatial web, or simply the geoweb. Now, instead, enormous > creative energy is pulling away into Google's essentially proprietary > mapping environments. > > Instead of competing with the grass roots, Chris Holmes, and others > have suggested that Google might do very well, by embracing open mapping. > there are two examples of intrinsic challenges to open mapping posed, > by Google's current geospatial services. > > Because google maps includes proprietary data from 3rd party vendors, > Navteq, Teleatlas, et. al. google is constrained, -and- constraining > open development, by prohibiting users and developers from including > google map tiles freely in other service environments, expecially > projects like Web Map Server, and Worldwind, an open source globe > produced by NASA. > > And, because of their legacy efforts, the Keyhole team is promoting > their proprietary KML, Keyhole Markup Language, diverting community > attention from the emerging WFS/GML tools created at great time and > expense by the open mapping community. > > Many of beleive and hope that Google can be convinced to do no evil' > in support of an open geospatial web. > > How? First by agregating, and combining user created google map hack > layers so that the Google user hacks and data are more important than > the Navteq, and Teleatlas base layers. Google could continue to ride > the growing wave of map hacking energy by enoouraging value of > -agregated- user hacks and applications, Google could become less > dependent on private data. Google could crawl for google map hacks, > and build tools to combine in layers, the user data -minus proprietary base layers. > > Given, Navteq and Teleatlas data IS more accurate and 'prettier' than > public source TIGER, and Open Streetmap data, Rich Gibson, one of the > authors of Mapping Hacks suggests, it would cool, and useful if Google > added a Tiger layer and allowed free-er. Second, by support a > re-engineering of Keyhole's code base to become completely > interoperable wiht open standards, so that users may easily import > standard data into Google Earth while preserving Keyhole's business > model of packaging premium data for high end users, like television broadcasters. > > Google historically has played a monumental role in making the > Internet usable by gaterhing and filtering massive amounts of data. > Unforutantely nothing like Google exists for geospatial and > cartographic data on the net, which is currently almost unfindable in > a baroque collection of gateways, libraries, 'one-stop' portals, and > repositories. Google could create a great new business, while > providing a huge public service by searching for, indexing and > presenting a comprehensive access to global geospatial data. > > Finally, just as Google actively supports the Mozilla foundation. > Google could provide definitive support to the birth of an open > geospatial web by should by providing significant finacial support > underwriting many struggling, but critically important efforts like > openstreetmap, civicmaps, World Wind, and WMS/WFS/GML related projects > like mapserver, Geoserver, uDig too. > > If google really is right on the edge between open mapping and a > closed vendor driven proprietary environment it shouldn't take much to > move away form the 'dark' side. Google will be welcomed as a > tremendously helpful entity in an open software ecosystem instead of > leaving open mappers to the futility of trying to compete, with the > Google 'bulldozer in the sandbox' > > We hope you will receive these suggestion in the constructive spirit > intended, and begin right away to incorporate these ideas in your > development, and by making a public statement as soon as possible in > support of an open ecosystem for the goepspatial web. > > Thanks, in advance, for your kind consideration. > > signed: > > Who else wants to sign, besides me? > > - mike liebhold --------------------------------------------------------------------- List hosting provided by Directions Magazine | www.directionsmag.com | To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message number: 18336
