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Real-Time Collaborative Mapmaking
savetz writes "Throughout October and November, citizens of Amsterdam were invited to wear a GPS tracker as they went about their lives. Their whereabouts were forwarded to a server which created a map of the city in real-time, based on "the sheer movements of real people." The site includes aggregate maps, and those created by individuals, including a subway driver, cyclist, and marathon trainer."
They gave a GPS to a subway driver? What next? GPS maps of deep mineshafts? : )
You can't take the sky from me...
this reminds me of a story of two guys who at intersections would carry the back wheels of the car over wheel sensors. thus the traffic department would have to account for 64.5 cars passing through the intersections.
Okay, it may seem a funny jumping-off point, but stick with me for a second. Digital society hates spam, but not nearly enough for anything to actually be done about it. I think that's because it's basically limited to doing damage to your Inbox.
Yet when everybody's walking around with wristwatches connected to GPS and the 'net, and Joe's Pizza and Meg's Jewelry and Walmart and Target all want to spam your watch with their current specials as you walk within a hundred feet of their stores, people would (I hope) find that far too invasive and seek iron-clad control over the data they receive.
Unfortunately, I don't think this is the likely scenario. Probably most device manufacturers will provide a preference which permits you to turn off "unsolicited advertising" delivered via a certain protocol, but other delivery methods (http, pop3, etc.) will remain just as viable. Too bad.
Steve
Boy, what do you think the odds are of a U.S. sponsored project like this that will dump all of the data into our new government database?
It gives new meaning to "Where Do You Want To Go Today", and sounds like a marketing/GOP wet dream.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
I was sitting around yesterday thinking about what else can be done with GPS besides geocaching, etc. This is pretty cool.
If you like this, you might like GPS drawing too.
,
faeryman
I've been using a Garmin GPS II+ that I originally bought for mapping backcountry nonmotorized trails, using a mountain bike. It was great for that, including its ability to upload its waypoints and track log to my PC, where I could integrate the data into mapmaking (GIS) software.
On the water, I found its articulated antenna and lack of waterproofing a liability. I used it in a housing (heavy-duty ziploc type), but found
it awkward. I just got a new Garmin eTrex, a 12-channel waterproof (1m for 30 min) unit that has the features I want. No internal maps, but I've never seen a handheld GPS that can compete with
the big-screen units in that department-- they're as good as an actual NOS chart.
If it were possible to do so, I would love to donate my map data to such a project - perhaps an open source map project? It could make for some exciting orienteering!
Stop corporate
Hey, what's that one that keeps wandering around that street corner...
Sticks and Stones may break my bones, but copyright will always protect me.
Finally, a way to track the "real people" movements of residents of Amsterdam. Now I can find the marijuana cafes and red-light clubs frequented by Dutchmen who know what they're doing, as opposed to settling for the crappy spots they push on tourists.
The images are absolutely fantastic, and go to demonstrate just how small our lives are. Cumulatively, all their users contribute to a very revealing map of Amsterdam; however, individually, most stay in a very small subset of the area. It's easy to see how those east-side/west-side stereotypes can develop given that most people really only live on one side and never really go to "the other side."
The visualization technique that they use is really cool too -- it lets you see more vividly the areas that get traversed (cumulatively) more heavily.
There's a great scene in Cryptonomicon where he writes about attaching lights to people's heads, then tracking the lights from a side view as they walk on and off street curbs. Graphing over time would produce a square wave, with sidewalks showing up as high lines, and streets as low lines.
The point is that Waterhouse is one of the kinds of people who could stare at boatloads of those graphs, and then emerge with an extremely detailed street map of London.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
One use I can think of this would be a data source for traffic reports. If the sensor is moving quickly, it's safe to assume that whereever that sensor is, there's a highway operating perfectly fine. If a sensor comes to a stop or goes slower than normal speed on a highway (excluding tollbooths and rest stations, zones that I'm sure will be quickly identified) that indicates that something has gone wrong such as an accident or blockage. Whatever it is doesn't matter, so much as the fact cars aren't going at the proper speed. What would result from this data is a hot-cold map of the highways that indicates pixel by pixel where the road is at full speed, and where it's not. The only thing is, I'd much rather that sensor in my car be reporting to a private traffic-reporting company than the government....
They should have asked me to participate, they could be having a most excellent map of the red light district by now!
Oh, it wasn't funded? Never mind.
It's not too hard! I'm interested in this sort of thing too.
:)
You'll need some software to gather your paths from the GPS, and some digital maps to overlay them on.
Some of the popular software is EasyGPS for the PC, and GPSy and MacGPS Pro for the Mac. You can download a free version of each.
The maps are a little harder to come by though. Here is a list to get you started. Some are free, some cost up to about $100 depending on size, scale, and detail. You can scan in your paper maps and calibrate them in some software too.
I think this is really cool - I'd like to have a map of North America and see where all I've been
,
faeryman
...cat. Just where the hell DOES he go when he vanishes for 3 days? Now If I can just tap into those orbiting "Star Wars" laser guns I could teach him to stay at home.
Bad KITTY!!! ***death ray come down from the sky***ZAP! Fried cat found 2 miles away.
Well maybe not...
Slashdot, home of supporters of free software, free music, and free speech.Except for Moderators that disagree with you.
Government tracking == bad, private group tracking data for limited purposes == good.
Tracking me to give me a speeding ticket every time my car's speed > 66 mph == bad... tracking me so that the world can know trafic's moving at 75 mph on route 3 good.
... you'd get a most excellent map of where the public restrooms are. Always useful when traveling to a foreign city.
Design for Use, not Construction!
Government Agent: How would you like a free child safety camera?
Average Geek: Screw you! You agent of MS...
Government Agent: What if I said that it ran linux?
Average Geek: Screw you...hmmm, did you say linux?
Government Agent: Yes, I did.
Average Geek: Does it support...
Government Agent: Ogg Vorbis? Yes, of course.
Average Geek: I'll take five.
Government Agent: Going to run a Beowulf, eh? Hehe...you crazy geeks.
It's a little known fact that the average moggy enjoys the intellectual pursuit of Cat Chess almost as much as sporadic violent confrontations with other random cats.
The rules (based upon observation) are pretty straight forward, and are as follow:
A point is scored by a cat that can simultaneously observe at least 2 other cats.
Any cat observed by 2 other cats simultaneously is out of the game.
That's it - so strategy plays a big part - on the one hand, a high vantage point lends itself to high scoring rounds, but has the increased danger of being spotted by other cats. These games can go on for days though, often ending only in a mass fight or when the competitors fancy some milk and maybe the chance to bat a small bird around for fun.
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
One thing I have noticed about a lot of open source stuff is that they all use those horrific Tiger maps. Tiger maps suck. Big time. They are good for just looking at street names, but when you want to use them for anything more than that they are not good at all. For example, the street I live on shows up on the tiger maps as being about 50 feet south of where it really is, and the intersection closest to my house is more than 150 feet off.
But, because tiger maps are free, that is what is used. However, if you want to build your own talking GPS navigation system, using those maps is a bad thing - the routes would be all goofed up.
So, I have been considering doing something like these guys so there could be some way to get decent maps out there for free that will give better results.
However, I see a number of potential problems. First, you can't just turn on a GPS and start recording data. My Magellan 315 starts averaging when you sit still. Get under an obstruction and the data it records is all over the place. After only an hour of sitting you would have somewhere around 100 data points that don't exist. That would be a lot of work for someone to clean up.
The other problem I see is really related to participation. It's one thing if you are in a small town with 50 or so streets in it - you would probably be more apt to get your town fully mapped. However, living in the Big City, I only really travel a few streets during a typical month - mainly highways and interstates, with the occassional side street. Since the ways I travel always have a ton of traffic on them, that means most everyone else goes that way too - probably including a good number of people who might be participating in such a project as well.
Then, when you spot someone in a interesting place, you could get control of his camera for some time. Maybe there could be the option donate the guy $5 and ask him to move 100 feet left.... now that's a real big brother scenario :) Anyway, it could be fun too, to be "in the place" when something interesting happens...talking about Amsterdam...(red) lights, camera, action :)
(Sorry: Former best friend).
OS Software is like love: The best way to make it grow is to give it away.
That's one of the cans of worms I have been pondering deeply ever since I demo-ed a PostGIS based system that lets random users lodge spatial data.How on earth do you do meaningful QA on that quantity of data? Especially when many people are happy to use layers such as TIGER.
FWIW, I think that collecting raw GPS tracks is a low value activity. I think the most value will come from validated overlays put together in a Wiki fashion. Leave it to the Cave Clanners to maintain a Wiki style layer of drains and urban tunnels, leave it to the geeks to maintain a WiFi layer. Pull you favorite overlay sites together in your PDA and enjoy an augmented reality...
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
One of the neat things I haven't seen comments on was the fact they were using GPRS to transmit the GPS data in real-time - so the GPS data really was uploaded as it was generated. This is the sort of thing that GPRS is really good for - it's low bandwidth (so doesn't cost an arm and a leg) and constantly updated.