AGI GeoCommunity'10 Postcodes, Points, Lines and Polygons

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We presented a plenary this week at the excellent AGI GeoCommunity'10 conference. With notable discussions on cloud based GIS, putting map libraries on the web and the balance between vector and raster data it was, as ever, a conference made by which streams you attended. The Cloud based stream was refreshing, especially after a few notable industry views that people simply don't get 'GIS' while subsequently carrying on to clearly illustrate where the whole problem lies. The AGI is a good crowd and hats off to the organizers, when you take a step back and look at the whole event, it was without question a notable success.

Getting back to  'Clouds' we were asked to create an inspirational movie for the opening session and decided to grab the HDHero, stick it on the outside window of a 5th floor apartment in Camden Town, London, and capture 10,000 images.

The result is below (best in 720p):



As plenary, part of the role is to provoke a bit of controversy to get people talking through the rest of a conference. Through shear accident this was suitably achieved and lessons learnt but as a side note the point was also raised that perhaps all the problem is within the industry is communication.

Our final call was to leave behind the term 'GIS' when communicating the benefits of geographical information to the wider audience and to be upbeat rather than consumed in postcodes, points, lines and polygons.

Stating the need to leave behind the term GIS is of course controversial but the same can be said of Neogeography (see our post, Come in Neogeography Your Time is Up). Terms come, terms go. Cyberspace, Virtual Reality, World Wide Web are all terms that nowadays look aged,  perhaps its time to add GIS to the list...

The Geospatial Industry in 2015: Summary and 35 Papers from the AGI

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The geospatial information (GI) industry is undergoing radical change. Stimulated by a range of new global challenges, the balance of power between existing and new players is shifting. UK Government policy is also undergoing transformation with the publication of the UK Location Strategy, the transposition of the INSPIRE Directive into UK law, the passing of the M

arine & Coastal Access Bill and plans to change the business model of Ordnance Survey. The economic strictures, under which the public and private sectors will need to operate, as we attempt to handle enormous public debt, are also certain to drive changes in behaviour.

There can be little doubt that in 5 years the industry will look very different. Over the past year the Association for Geographic Information (AGI) has been exploring the future of the geospatial industry in the UK in the first public foresight project of this kind. Edited by Andrew Coote, Steven Feldman and Robin McLaren, The Geospatial Industry in 2015, has a medium-term horizon five years hence.

In seeking diverse points of view, the study invited industry opinion formers to contribute Expert Papers in their particular field, covering data and technology, vertical market sectors and policy drivers.

This is an extremely useful document for anyone interested in geo-spatial issues. You can read the summary (4Mb pdf) as well as the full 10 papers on policy, 13 papers on markets and 12 papers on data and technology, including our own on augmented reality.

Its quite a resource...

AGI and Web 2.0

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The last two days have been spent at the AGI Conference in Stratford Upon Avon.

Its been a Neogeography and Web 2.0 dominated conference with a number of talks that while interesting have been worrying for their basic level of explanation – do people in the GIS industry really need to be told what KML or Web 2.0 is? Surely rather than a slightly ‘jack and jane’ view the emphasis should be on applications, techniques and experiences.

Perhaps it was just me but I found the general level of understanding disappointing. Or perhaps I just assume people in the GI industry should know this stuff as its at the heart of the GI revolution. Then again it could simply be a lack of coffee this morning and being too close to the subject. That said i did come away slightly saddened by it all...

Anyhow that aside there was an interesting talk on ‘The Ripening of Digital Globes – From Earth Viewing to Decision Support’ by Johannes Kebeck of Microsoft. In short there is a close tie up between ESRI and Virtual Earth with the main point being that Virtual Earth is merely a ‘viewer’ for information, all the tech stuff still needs a GIS behind the scenes. Of course this is mainly common sense, perhaps of more interesting was the comment that Microsoft are in the Virtual Earth game purely for the advertising revenue that if realized could surpass the income of the Windows operating system.

Of course perhaps that’s common sense as well, we know Microsoft and Google are not in the field for their shear love of geography. They have however changed the game and opened up the sharing of geographical information to the masses, which can only be a good thing…

See edparsons.com for a few more thoughts on the conference as well as the All Points Blog.

You can read our papers on Neogeography, Crowd Sourcing etc via our publications page.

Also note our session call for abstracts with regards the AAG conference on Concepts, Tools and Applications: The Rise of Neogeography