I have a love for maps because they can be the most rich, yet easy-to-understand communication tools. ReliefWeb, a website devoted to distributing time-sensistive information about humanitarian crises, is an excellent resource for insightful maps and infographics. You can sign up to receive email updates of all their new maps. Suff like this map showing [...]

Google maps offers the tools (an API) for creating maps using their interface, and this is an example of what I’m creating for the local Piedmont Biofuels community website.

This is minor news in most contexts: Google Earth (the software power tool that feels like a toy) has been released for the Mac.
Aside from the obvious usefulness of this release, this signals a money-where-their-mouth-is confirmation thae Google isn’t just reinforcing Microsoft’s monopolistic dominance.
Google has offered a wealth of opportunities for open source, [...]

I have spent an awful lot of (relative) time writing about maps in this space over the last month, but this one really caught my eye.
Declan Butler has recently worked with the journal Nature to publish a map of the H5N1 avian influenza virus outbreaks over the last two years. He used some data [...]

All state-collected geographic information should be shared, for a myriad of reasons. Now you can add your name to a growing list of folks that agree.
Geodata is a public good. Open access to it, under a ‘Commons’ (ShareAlike) license, is the best way to see its full benefits realized by industry and citizens. At [...]

The Community Mapping Network (CMN)provides an online mapping application that allows folks in British Columbia, Canada, to create and edit information about environmental resources in their areas.
The application is used for sustainable city planning efforts and other types of environmentally-sensitive decision making.
Perhaps more interestingly, the CMN also hosts a directory of international [...]

Just discovered a beautiful resource of maps (mostly environmental info, especially soil) for most of the countries of Africa. (Found via Kikuyumoja’s realm.)
This is an incredibly thorough, high-quality resource, with scanned resolutions that will knock any map-lover’s socks off. The pages are easy to navigate, with appropriately-sized thumbnails and then really large downloadables. [...]

How do you make a regular cellphone location-aware? Apparently, you monitor the records indicating which tower the phone is on. Movement from one tower to the next can give highly accurate readouts on the movement of individuals and crowds.
I wouldn’t think that this would give you manageable data that was accurate enough to do anything [...]

Being a great way to communicate quickly, maps can also be incredibly dense with information. When they are put to a wholesome use, maps, like apple pie and puppies, deserve to have a special place in every home.
Take, for example, the incredible work coming out of the Dutch group Mapping Worlds. They’ve beautifully mapped [...]

Andy Carvin, director of the Digital Divide Network, recently posted a fascinating, heartbreaking perspective just how much damage has been done. He found the images at a strange condo site, condobuzz.com. The images are overlays of the flooding with other metropolitan areas. (Note this is just the flooding. The hurricane damages, if in the midwest, [...]

Kathyn Cramer, based in New York, is doing great work with Google maps. The following information is quoted from her blog.
Step 1: Go to Google Maps and enter the address. Click on the button that says “Hybrid” on the upper right. You will get an image with a speech ballon pointing to a thumbtack [...]

With a nod to International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day (Friday, Sept. 2). … Crossposted on the DDN list.
I am beginning research into ways in which mapping technologies like GIS (wikipedia: GIS) are being used (and can potentially be used) to help avert or cope with humanitarian disasters.
The tragedy of New Orleans has given [...]