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Towards an Open Geolocation Database

Posted by kdawson on from the lat-lng-is-the-new-address dept.

theodp writes "With the location land rush in full swing, TechCrunch's Erick Schonfeld declares it's time for an open database of places and calls on the Big Dogs of location — Twitter, Google, Foursquare, Gowalla, SimpleGeo, Loopt, Citysearch, et al. — to make it so. An open database that maps latitude and longitude coordinates to businesses, points of interest, and even people's homes should just be part of the basic fabric of the mobile Web. Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley was enthusiastic about the idea (in a standing-up-at-a-cocktail-party sort of way), says Schonfeld, while Twitter founder Jack Dorsey was a little bit more lukewarm and cautious. Time for Larry and Sergey to invite the Families to a sit-down at 37.423021,-122.083739?"

5 of 74 comments (clear)

  1. Government data by Anspen · · Score: 3, Interesting

    A good start would be the free release of postal code and mapping data by governments. After all this is information collected with public money, so it should be available to all citizens. The UK has or will release mapping and postcode data. But most countries still only allow the data to be sold for hefty prices. The most ridiculous part is that in some countries the postal code date is the property of privatized former monopolies.

    1. Re:Government data by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      As a GIS Tech for a county in Michigan I can probably provide a little insight on this. While quite a bit of information is available free of charge at the state level (http://www.mcgi.state.mi.us/mgdl/) county/city governments (where the high accuracy data tends to be) tend charge for data for one main reason. The actual "Data" tends to only be requested by out of city/county, and most often state agencies. The Maps/PDF's/In office/online means of accessing the data are utilized heavily by the Local Taxpayers/Companies, but in most cases there is no one local which has the capabilities/expertise to utilize the raw data. Meaning that the people actually paying for the datas creation aren't the main beneficiaries of the requestes for the raw data. Most of the data requests are from large data aggregate firms looking to generate mailing lists ("You're in a flood zone, buy [the company who paid us]'s flood insurance") & business feasibility studies (think new Walmart/Lowes). If a way could be agreed upon to filter who is local and who isn't and enough people wanted it (most likely expressed by them going to a commissioners meeting to get the ball rolling) I'm sure local individuals could get data free of charge.

      "postal code [data] is the property of privatized former monopolies"
      In michigan its the power companies (I think) for the most part that handle the postal assignments. But trust me, they don't want it. I've heard of them practically begging the counties/state to take it off their hands. If they do charge unreasonable fees for it, I believe its in the hope that some big firm (google, microsoft, ect) will come along and fill in for some of the money their loosing on the program.

  2. Re:OSM by solevita · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It hasn't been filled with all the useful information within the above mentioned companies databases.

    If only there was some why they could add it to the database...

    I think the main reason that many businesses may not get behind the idea of adding their data to OpenStreetMap (although that is what they should be doing) is that if they do they will lose the ability to control the commercial monopoly on the data. If you really want an open database with all this stuff in (as the summary suggests), OSM is the best way forward.

  3. Re:Its called openstreetmap by Midnight+Thunder · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Openstreetmap already contains plenty of points of interest and businesses (not sure about homes yet), its editable by anyone. Lets use it as a framework for adding to this data.

    There are other projects such as Geonames and Gisgraphy. Between the three of them you have a good starting point.

    --
    Jumpstart the tartan drive.
  4. Re:OSM by chdig · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It is terrific, however some cities (ahem Toronto, Vancouver, and others.) are releasing their municipal border data under a different licence than OSM (openstreetmaps), which is possibly even worse than not keeping them up to date properly. If this continues, a developer will need to navigate dozens or hundreds of unique licences in order to display data legally. A serious problem, that needs to be nipped in the bud ASAP.