Category: Blog

I watched a BBC4 documentary on my TVDrive last night (Yes it is sort of working now – for everything but LOST !) a programme called “Journeys into the ring of Fire” which looked at how the physical environment of Japan had effected things like urban settlement patterns and even the Japanese national character… does this sound like Geography to you ? Well the presenter is a geologist and all of the above is actually according to the programme due to Geology.

OK maybe I am a little sensitive about this, but the programme coincided with an email i got from David Rayner who is running a campaign to improve the profile of Geography in the media called “Give Geography its
Place”.

David does have a point I think, the GIS industry has worked hard to lose the Geography label coming up with terms like spatial and geospatial.. why ?

What is wrong with describing what we do as Geography ?

I’m on my way to the ESRI UC next week, and it good to see that they at least are still proud to be geographers, and what better call to action could a discipline want then the conference title “Geography Communicating Our World”

An interesting post from Tim who is a GeoWeb 2006 in Vancouver. Great new blog by the way..

Tim notes comments from Microsoft about their plans to create 3D city models in a “different” way to Google. Just speculating but maybe the different approach its something to do with the fact that Microsoft also own a gaming platform ?

The Very Spatial podcast this week celebrated it’s first year anniversary with an interview with Intergraph CTO and fellow Brit, Peter Batty.

Peter seems to have a real challenge on his hands bringing together a diverse range of Intergraph products around a common framework. The approach seems to be realistic as the scope sounds similar to the work ESRI did with ArcGIS, and to a lesser extent the work we are doing at OS, – these things take a long time !!

Interesting views around location intelligence and it potential for security applications, clearly Intergraph’s strongest market.

As with most Very Spatial podcasts, a little US centric, but well worth a listen. Congratulations Sue, Jesse and Frank !!

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.

So on Monday night I attended the RSA debate on the “Free our Data” campaign. I was originally scheduled to speak representing the OS, but was replaced on the night by my boss.. I was quite happy for this, as Vanessa is much better at representing Ordnance Survey and the other Trading Funds than myself, I sometimes have personal conflicting views with my organisation which often leak out by mistake !!

So what are my thoughts..

I very much enjoyed the event, not sure to what extent it was really a debate, many people came with their existing views and agenda well established and I doubt if many of these were changed by the end. I was very impressed that the event attracted so many people on a hot summers evening – well over 200 people !

Much of the debate did focus around the OS and its position in the UK GI market, you can understand why this happened, but I did feel for the non GI industry part of the audience, who may not have picked up on all the intricacies of some of the arguments around Ordnance Survey.

For me a key point that I personally think needs clarification is the difference between business models and licensing frameworks, in relation to the OS in particular. There remains an active and valid debate around the business model of OS which actually boils down to who pays – taxpayer or user and which model would provide the greatest benefit to UK PLC.

My personal views around this are quite clear and well known, in that I believe the user pays model is best, primary because it establishes a direct link between the beneficiary of data and the supplier. A model funded by general taxation would put the OS in the general melting pot of Government spending and traditionally, in all countries, the funding of geographic information is never high on any politicians agenda, look at the chronic underfunding of the USGS for example. This is not the case interestingly I would suggest for statistical information, which perhaps more directly is seen to drive policy ?

I think it is important however to separate out the business model debate from issues around the licensing of OS data which is of concern to some of the OS partners represented at the event.

I don’t think anybody would argue that there are no issues with current OS licensing, the framework today is a result of a number of years incremental additions, changes , and modifications which have resulted in something which is difficult to understand and even more difficult to change to better reflect the needs of our partners in rapidly changing markets.

There are some elements even, which I personally find very difficult to defend, but the bottom line here is that there is no silver bullet which is going to change these overnight – change is absolutely needed in my opinion, but it will take time and commitment both from the OS in trying to find simplicity while maintaining a level playing field, and from our partners who need almost unbearable patience.

if you attended I’d be interested in your views, the debate will be podcast in due course from the RSA website.

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.