Openstreetmap is an effort to break out of the mapping cartel. You may not realize that a very few companies have a lock on the maps you use. Google Maps may appear open, but they use Navteq maps which was just bought out by Nokia.
This becomes important if you want to use a map in Wikipedia, for example. You can't use anything copyrighted, which these maps are. For example, suppose I wanted to show the perfect location for an underground nuclear waste repository in downtown Toronto! I would have to use an open-source map, or they would sue me. You can't use a Google map in a blog, unless you link it to their revenue source.
Navteq has 700 people a day doing maps. This new effort could have thousands (their server is already dying!). I'm doing my neighbourhood, and if you are retired, or writing about computer security (ha,ha!), then you can do this while walking, driving, or cycling.
2 comments:
I'm linking to this! I'll have to see if our GPS gadget is still around - Richard was going to give it away. Meanwhile, I hope we can just annotate what others are putting in.
You don't really need a gps for the common streets. They have a really good satellite overlay, which I have checked. You can put on gas stations, shops, hospitals, etc.
Basically, you take their on-line editor, and you trace over the streets that you know. I cheat a little by using Google maps for correct spelling.
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