The News (& Maps!) Revolution
November 17, 2009 | 5:40 pmThat’s right folks. The very same revolution that is reported ad nauseum by the press, about the press, is also taking place in an equally ancient medium: maps.
Tell me this blurb from the New York Times story about “geo-volunteerism” doesn’t sound like it fell right off the back of the paper wagon…
But Tele Atlas says its customers, who might be in delivery trucks or emergency vehicles, can’t rely fully on community-created maps, any more than historians can rely on Wikipedia.
“Most of our customers expect a level of due diligence and quality that is way more than what a community is going to put together,” said Patrick McDevitt, vice president of global engineering at Tele Atlas.
Defenders of the amateur approach point out that professionally created maps often have errors and can be slow to add road closures and other updates. Google has moderators who try to verify the accuracy of users’ changes, unless they are very minor, while OpenStreetMap relies on its members to police changes.
A statement about the “level of due diligence and quality” could just as easily come from the mouth of a hardened traditional journalist, while the retort could have rolled off the tongue of a sassy, Buddy Holly-esque blogger.
Every once in a while it’s helpful to remember that this dramatic shift is much bigger than just “news”. It’s about the future of all printed information. No single industry (or company) should deny that kind of flood. Sink or swim.
But enough pontificating. The best part about the article? Decaturite John Kittle Jr. gets a shout-out!
Volunteers needed to work on Open Street Map in Decatur. See http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=33.7777&lon=-84.29888&zoom=15&layers=B0F for the current map. Post interest here and I’ll figure out how to get in touch with you.
I can vouch for the inaccuracies on maps like google and mapquest. We lived on a dead end street in oakhurst and the maps had it cutting through to another street. We would see people drive down our street, with their hands up and saying things like “WTF?” alll the time. It got to be a pretty fun occurrence.
Left Wing: If you post the name of your street and which end has the dead end, I’ll be glad to check on it in OpenStreetMap and make an update if needed.
East Benson Street. Says it cuts through to Candler.
looks good in OSM – see http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=33.76135&lon=-84.29404&zoom=17&layers=B000FTF
It’s not just google and mapquest but all of those GPS thingamajiggies that people mount on their dashboard and use instead of hard copy maps. My parents have one and those devices are amazing. They once got around a traffic jam on I-75 near McDonough and got to Decatur via dirt roads and all sorts of amazing detours that worked. I’m imagining that people are following one of those devices faithfully, while a robovoice says “turn left on Oakview” and the screen shows a little car doing so, and then end up on the dead end in total confusion.