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Inside Microsoft's New Digital Photo Project
robyn217 writes "While Microsoft Research plays 'Big Brother' to a young hiker's trip across North America, it breaks new ground in digital photography by combining metadata, like location via GPS, with the image. Its online presence looks impressive as it displays digital photo albums on a map of the world, but it's slow and unwieldy for the most part and may not be better than a standard travelogue site. This week, I took a closer look at the project currently named the World-Wide Media eXchange (WWMX)."
They are the freaking sponsor! You make it sound like some grand conspiracy.
I'm glad microsoft is getting into this kind of thing. National Geographic has been doing a dismal job over the past few months, and there really are not enough players in the game. It's funny, in my experience most geeks really do like the great outdoors, so it seems a proper marriage to me!
Mod +5 Drunk
They have been using embeded data in TIFFs for years in nav. programs that overlayed a map image with altitude and lat/long.
...if a Linux-based solution was doing exactly the same thing terminology like 'big brother' would be nowhere to be found. I find your write-up to be double plus biased.
I currently run a website, TrailRegistry that does exactly this. Actually it does a whole lot more. The general tilt of my site is hiking related, so the pictures are generally of views, shelters, mountains, etc... What I think is more important is sharing of trip data collected by GPS. So for instance, if you hiked an unmarked trail in your area, you could upload the GPS track log to TrailRegistry, and TrailRegistry will create a Topo map (On the fly) for other users to use.
Please check it out, You might find it usefull. Also,I allways love feedback on what I could do better..
Check out TrailRegistry.com, my hiking site, Maps, altitude pr
Great, lets link to a website that has nothing but photos and thumbnails! Ooh wait, better yet! Let's find one that organizes them dynamically with non-trivial algorithms!!
Are we going for a new slashdotting record or something?
~D
This sig has been enciphered with a one-time pad. It could say almost anything.
While trying to view the microsoft link above I got the following error message:
Still amazingly honest for Microsoft!/p
A few years ago an old Jeep buddy of mine mentioned an idea for a web site like this - people could drive around Utah, take pictures, and record the GPS coordinates of where the picture was taken so that others could find the same place for camping/etc.
This just seems to do something of what iPhoto does - attaches some meta-data (in this case, GPS coordinates, time&date, etc) to the file.
I'd say this could be pretty cool, though of course I'd like to see an open standard used and the ability to turn it off. I don't think I mind all cell phones by 2005 having GPS (the ability to save lives could be huge for 9-1-1 services), but I want the capacity to shut the damn thing off so Psycho Boy Jones can't jump me because he didn't like my recipe for spicy sweet mashed potatos.
Side note for those worried about privacy: there was a story I was reading about a service for cell phones in Japan. Suppose your spouse calls and wants a picture of where you are, and instead of working late at the office (like you said you were), you were out at the bar with your friends. This service will forward a picture of your office to them instead of your current location.
With GPS being mandatory in cell phones by 2005 (at least according to the article), you wonder how other people will tap into it? Is this a 9-1-1 services only thing, or is this "add to my GPS" list so people in other phones have your coordinates at all time? (Something that might be a new level of parental control when your teenager goes out with friends for the night....)
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Over the years I've seen many pictures of places I'd like to visit (as I'm sure the rest of you have as well). IMHO, including GPS and other location metadata in a picture is a great idea! Now we'll know exactly where that beautiful water fall we want to visit is rather than just knowing that it's somewhere in Ecuador.
The downside of this is that every tourist with a GPS can find places that are virtually unspoiled by man and end up spoiling them.
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
I can't wait until GPS technology is small enough and cheap enough to put inside the camera. It'd be great for looking at holiday photos...
"Where the hell was that?"
"Lemme check the map... Oh, that was St Jude's Cathedral."
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak