edparsons.com

So things are beginning to calm down in regard to the hype around the introduction of the video capable iPod. But the big news I think behind the hardware is that Apple have cut a deal with ABC television in the States to distribute via the iTunes music store (iTMS), television programmes including Lost and Desperate Housewives (these are not available outside the US due to licensing arrangements) .

For a $1.99 you can download any of these programmes the day after they are shown to view on your computer as well as of course your iPod.

As with the original iPod it’s success comes not only from a its fabulous design, but also from the ease of obtaining content for it, one click at iTMS brings a single track or an album right onto your device. What Apple successfully did was to arrange distribution deals with all the major record companies, against their better judgement, to put in place pricing and licensing agreements that are very simple -a single universal price for each track, playback restricted to five devices etc. The result HUGH SUCCESS and now they are doing the same for video.

In some ways you could argue that Google Local (nee maps) has started to do the same thing, but I think the GI industry needs to learn a lot from the iTunes experience, and yes, that does include the Ordnance Survey. The OS needs to introduce simpler licensing, making available small amounts of mapping data on demand for the increasingly technology literate, traditional topographic map user.

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

Adena at All Points Blog reports on some very interesting news from the USGS, which seems to be beginning the process of outsourcing map production. New USGS Director Patrick Leahy is reported to be looking to outsource the production of maps in flood risk areas to state and local government and importantly commercial suppliers. This follows the inability of USGS to deliver appropriate mapping following the Katrina flooding of New Orleans.

As I pointed out at the SoC conference last month much of the topo mapping covering this part of the states is nearly 30 years old, a result of the under funding of the USGS over many decades. I wonder if this out-sourcing will come with additional funding – or are the USGS falling into the trap believing that “somebody else” will be able to do what they themselves has been unable to for the same money ?

Or maybe we are beginning to see the commercialisation of topo data in the United States ?

Written and submitted from the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, using its free 802.11 network.

Like many ESRI shops who build “Enterprise” class applications we at the OS are increasing looking to use linux based servers from now on – and our vendor of choice at the moment is HP who have a nice range of AMD Opteron based Proliant servers. Nothing unusual in this I hear you say, indeed not, it is actually increasingly difficult to source 32bit processor servers in this class – however the problem my system architects are trying to get around at the moment is that ESRI don’t officially support 64bit processors !!

As much as I buy into the whole ArcServices concept and will deploy ArcServer based applications in the future, this seems a little strange?

So ESRI Technical product management if you are listening…

Jo of Mapping Hacks has responded to my call for her to attempt to collect detailed mapping to the specification of the OS without access to the survey grade GPS and photogrammetry, with the usual rhetoric… but Jo will you take up the challenge ?

I think Jo actually accepts the need for the OS to continue it’s role in capturing large scale vector mapping for the country, this is an expensive business (not just toys) – our opinions differ as to how this is funded.

Jo favours the state funding of these activities, while I and the current government favour the user paying.

btw

– Getmapping do collect imagery on behalf of the OS under contract already..

– The NIMSA agreement represents a “at cost” contract to deliver mapping services to government and represents less than 10 % of the OS revenue.

So many contrasts where to begin… but I have really fallen in love with India, despite the clear poverty visible on almost every street corner, the dynamism of this country is amazing.

India is running an e-GOV programme which makes the efforts of the UK seem rather underwhelming, and although I think I still need convincing on the true value of this, the aim to install 2Mb broadband connections to every local government office in India is breathtaking when you think how many offices there are in the very rural parts of this huge country.

Much on the informed debate at the Graticule conference has been around the upcoming GALILEO programme, the EU programme to launch a Global Navigation Satellite System. It would be fair to say that there was not universal support for this, with many questioning the need for higher accuracy positioning technology when WAAS, EGNOS and the Indian developed GAGAN system can provide improved performance of the current GPS and GLONASS satellites.

I think these questions are missing the important value of quality assurance built into the system which also provides real-time alerts of poor accuracy data, a point made forcefully by Jorn Tjaden of the GALILEO Joint Undertaking, a real requirement for high end navigation requirements such as landing aircraft !

More pressing questions are those I think about the business model for GALILEO, how much funding can really be expected from commercial operators as a “free to air” service is mandated, how many customers will pay for the higher quality service ? I think a Public Private Partnership model is right, the split where the majority of funding comes from the private sector may need to change?

In the location Intelligence arena I was disappointed at the amount of progress in terms of application development, little seems to have been done so far perhaps due to the lack of up to date geodata, although I was impressed by the work of SiRF who are the manufacturing of most OEM GPS chipsets found in phones and pda’s

In my presentation I made my usual point that LBS was never going to be the killer app, to see real value in location, all applications need to be made location aware, so we get away from the current mad situation where I have to type my location into Google Local search even though my wifi enabled PowerBook can be easily located on the network using technology like Skyhook.

And now I’m off to eat another curry !!

Written and submitted from the Taj Place Hotel, Delhi, using the hotels 802.11 network.

This weekend I’m travelling to India to deliver a keynote presentation at Graticule the first International conference on positional technology and Location Intelligence to take place in India. Understandably perhaps the focus on these technologies has been in the west, however this is changing.

India not only offers highly skilled engineers and scientists who are advancing the industry globally, but also has an enormous potential market for the next generation of “location aware” applications. I’ll report back on the conference here next week.