Comments for Brain Off

Comment on Technology, Hype, Marginalization by What it means to “get it” – Mikel Maron on Building Digital Technology for Our Planet « The Practical Radical

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 18:02:03 +0000

[...] Technology, Hype, Marginalization [...]

Comment on Technology, Hype, Marginalization by Patrick Meier

Patrick Meier — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 11:47:28 +0000

Great post, Mikel, thanks for sharing

Comment on Technology, Hype, Marginalization by Ben

Ben — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 07:16:39 +0000

Hey Mikel,

Great to read about your adventures into new areas. Certainly Mukuru and Kibera mapping projects can learn from one another. Also nice to see the Kibera project possibly being replicated elsewhere.

Greetings,

Ben

Comment on Freedom and Restrictions in Open Data by OpenStreetMap Chile » Blog Archive » Libertad y Restricciones en Datos Abiertos

Sat, 26 Jun 2010 03:27:40 +0000

[...] por Mikel Maron en Brain Off Etiquetas: Frederik Ramm, libertad, Mikel Maron, osmf, principios, restricciones, rusia Este [...]

Comment on geo.lici.us : geotagging hosted services by Hello World » Blog Archive » Twitter Annotations vs. Flickr Machine Tags

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 22:30:40 +0000

[...] Flickr folks (following the prior art by the geo.licio.us folks) defined Machine Tags in this manner: # What are machine [...]

Comment on Freedom and Restrictions in Open Data by John

John — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 01:13:55 +0000

@Eric unless you are in Russia you most likely aren’t breaking any local laws, and users can filter out any information they like from the database, as for culturally sensitive sites, I’m not sure what to do there, although in terms of vandalism this is no different than people going into cemeteries and knocking over headstones, which also happens, so I guess we shouldn’t map cemeteries for the same reason?

Comment on Freedom and Restrictions in Open Data by Eric Wolf

Eric Wolf — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 17:43:09 +0000

A few years ago, I had a similar discussion about mapping petroglyphs in the southwest USA. Aboriginal American sites are frequently vandalized, especially in very remote locations. Many of those sites are sacred places. It one of the reasons many tribes maintain their own GIS databases under tight security.

I guess it depends on which side you are on. If you are on the Russian Military side, then you are concerned about protecting your bases much the same as the American tribes are concerned about protecting their sacred places. Because we are not on the side of the Russian Military (and we view the Military as oppressive in nature), we feel mapping the bases is an activist expression.

Maybe we need anonymous accounts that can add contentious data which can be easily filtered.

Comment on Freedom and Restrictions in Open Data by John

John — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:56:28 +0000

You also have the Chinese planning to start enforcing their mapping regulations, and they don’t stop at military locations, although as the blog author of this post he correctly points out that if civilians have access to this information multinational corporations and foreign governments had it long ago, so the crack downs are more likely to be protectionism of local industry and government owned entities selling satnav data and equipment.

http://www.ogleearth.com/2010/05/china_officiall.html

Comment on What would it take to map an entire country? by Jeff Haack

Jeff Haack — Mon, 03 May 2010 22:18:14 +0000

The NGO structure JumpStart has built in Georgia is, in my opinion, an apt and sustainable way forward. After our experience in Palestine it became clear that impact requires a lasting effort in a community and the encouragement of local skills and ownership. It’s not merely about mapping a country, but about understanding where that, conceptually, meets societal needs, and building value therein. Sustainability for Open Maps Caucasus comes by understanding the convergence of digital technologies with community mapping, social fabric, governance, and civil society, and filling a need within that sphere. We’re not expecting OMC’s community mapping focus to last forever, but that concept, at the very heart of it is meaningful and sustainable, because accessing the tools for extracting and considering not oil or timber, but information, strengthens a society and can make it more prone to long term development.

Great post, all efforts which will be certainly interesting to watch.

Comment on What would it take to map an entire country? by Christian O. Petersen

Christian O. Petersen — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 05:31:52 +0000

Thanks for the kind words about CloudMade’s efforts to support the mapping. Just wanted to point out that the ambassador program was replaced with an effort to support more local effort like the Atlanta Mapathon with planning, train the trainer and PR. This is an ongoing effort and includes working closely with both individuals, companies, organizations, local government and press to support OpenStreetMap.