I will add my two pence worth. My homeland, the Isle of Man, is (so far as I know) the only country in Europe to operate the US public domain policy on map data. Thus I understand you can get the 1:50 000 LandRanger, 1:1250 LandLine, air photos, etc all for nothing. The GB OS actually makes most of the maps but under contract to the Manx government who are the copyright owners.
And I bet most of you don't even know it has its own government, let alone the world's oldest democracy (979AD). Also first country in Europe to give women the vote (1865), first country to issue Euro coins, etc. Our (XYZs) World and Europe Wall Maps are probably also the only ones in the world that include the Manx flag and list it along with the rest of the countries. So there you are - you have learnt something you never wanted to know late on a Friday. Have a nice weekend Tim PS: see www.gov.im (and no pesky .uk in there either!) Dr Tim Rideout Director Visit XYZ at the Cape Town International Book Fair, June 2006, Frankfurt Book Fair, Oct 2006, Intergeo Munich Oct 2006 or IMTA World in Singapore, Nov 2006. The XYZ Digital Map Company Unit 9 Phase 2 Hardengreen Business Park Dalhousie Road Dalkeith Scotland EH22 3NX Tel +44 131 454 0426 Fax +44 131 454 0443 Mobile + 44 7766 825937 E-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Uffe Kousgaard Sent: 10 March 2006 17:31 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [MI-L] Supply of GIS data in UK and Europe compared to US To add to what Alan and Bill has already said: Let me quote the article: "One government makes the data it collects available free to all: the United States. It is no accident that it is also the country that has seen the rise of multiple mapping services (such as Google Maps, Microsoft's MapPoint and Yahoo Maps)" All of these 3 services use commercial data, so perhaps it is an accident after all? Other reasons? Furthermore it is not just the US supplying a lot of data for free, Canada is doing too: www.geobase.ca. This is quite new, but also much higher quality data than the free ones in the US. "UK and Europe" ? I wonder when the UK starts feeling a part of Europe :-) Regards Uffe Kousgaard ----- Original Message ----- From: "Steve McArthur" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, March 10, 2006 4:11 PM Subject: [MI-L] Supply of GIS data in UK and Europe compared to US > Hi all > > Hope this is not too off topic, but a collegue just pointed me to an > interesting article regarding the supply of geographic data in the UK > and Europe.There is some interesting comparisons to what is done over in > the US. I'd be interested in what others on the list think. > > http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1726229,00.html > > Regards > Steve _______________________________________________ MapInfo-L mailing list [email protected] http://www.directionsmag.com/mailman/listinfo/mapinfo-l _______________________________________________ MapInfo-L mailing list [email protected] http://www.directionsmag.com/mailman/listinfo/mapinfo-l
