Virtual Earth in Use for Golf Site

Virtual Earth has been combined with CyberGolf, essentially a golf marketing site to form CyberGolfCities,  a site “to complete the search process for golf consumers; city-specific sites are tooled with multidimensional mapping to ease the challenge of golf course location.” That’s from the press release.

I’m not sure what “multidimensional mapping” means here, nor am I sure about “the challenge of golf course location.” The latter to me speaks to finding land to build a new course, but then, I’m a GIS geek.

The site looks like a basic mashup and I point it out here since it’s nice to see a Virtual Earth one, one someone considered worthy of a press release. Frankly, I was disappointed, but I have to keep reminding myself, VE (and others offerings like it) are about advertising, not geospatial apps. So, in that sense, it is successful enough, I guess.

Says Stephen Lawler, general manager of the Virtual Earth Business Unit at Microsoft, “Cybergolf’s use of Virtual Earth’s satellite imagery, coupled with rich mapping capabilities, has created an incredibly powerful yet simple tool to view local city golf courses and their surroundings.” That’s sort of true - you can use a VE map to find little flags that identify courses (I could not decipher the difference between green and blue flags) and see map or aerial views. But, there’s no special mapping of the courses that I found - just a link to a Cyber City Golf page of the course, or the course’s own website. The Cyber City pages, per the press release, “feature golf courses located on interactive maps with photos of the golf courses and GPS satellite views.” (Yes, the use of the term GPS is gratuitous and wrong…) I found no satellite views or Bird’s Eye views, on those pages, but perhaps I didn’t know where to look.

Software-based GPS in Distribution

RF Micro Devices is offering a software based GPS solution to some of its customers with full distribution expected this summer. The vendor expects that a software solution will increase use of GPS since it does not require the expense of a dedicated chip.

On the other hand, the company will have to charge something for the software. That’s not besing discussed just now. Further, it will be interesting to see how well the solution works in comparison to chip-based systems. One other factor, if it can use an antenna, that will continue to be a hardware cost. So, we are not out of the hardware woods just yet…but maybe soon.

Quote of the Week

“Studies show that drive-time-to-workout is a key factor in determining whether a person actually uses that gym membership card. “

The South Bend Tribune explains why is includes a map in its 2006 Fitness Center Directory. We can’t seem to get around that principle of least effort as it relates to geography…

More on the US Geospatial Budget

GCN reports on which agencies will get more funding in 2007 and which will get less. In the details are how specific geospatial efforts will be funded.

One of the programs slated for an increase is the Geological Survey’s Landsat Data Continuity Mission, which would receive an additional $16 million to build a system to process data from the Landsat 8 satellite set to be launched in 2010. The remote-sensing satellite gathers data important for business, land management and scientific purposes, Interior said.

Also for USGS, the budget proposes creation of a multihazards pilot to merge information on various risk areas into consolidated form to support department planning.

[...]

But the administration seeks to slow down spending on the National Information Exchange program, a gateway for electronic links to EPA’s data, from $19.4 million in 2006 to $17.5 million next year.

So, Landsat 8 is funded. Good!

Now, what’s this about a multihazards pilot? Didn’t we do something like this already? I wrote a lot about the OGC’s multiharzard mapping initiative in my first years with the organization and have heard little since. The website is down as I write.

I do recall hearing about the NIE from EPA, which was another thing that sounded like a good place to use standards. Too bad funding is down for that effort.

MapPoint Web Service 4.1: Timing, News and the Web

Like many other bloggers I seek out interesting geospatial tidbits for this blog. I try hard to keep my skeptic hat on because I think that’s what’s needed in these times (and perhaps that’s part of why the nice people at Directions pay me…)

Tuesday I ran into this article at Telematics Update about MapPoint Web Service 4.1. I read the text, dated 2/7/06, searched news sites for other mentions and tried to remember if I’d covered that announcement here or at Directions Magazine. I found a lack of other coverage in the U.S. (example, MP2K Magazine), but a bit from the international press (example, European news site). After checking (Google searching!) this blog I found that I did note it, on January 24.

So I dug further. One blog posted 4.1 going live on January 23. Our GIS world’s James Fee noted it on the 24th citing the Virtual Earth Blog, which I too cited. The MapPoint Development Center on MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network) has two posts 1/18 and 1/19. I didn’t find anything on the Press Pass section of Microsoft’s site. That’s the part for journalists.

So, what’s going on? Nothing, really. No one did anything wrong. We just forgot about geography!

There was no press release on MapPoint 4.1 in the U.S. Instead, it was announced on MSDN and via a blog. That’s not a problem; I applaud companies that don’t do a press release when one is not necessary. (Google’s a pro at this.)

But, there was a press release for Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) launched yesterday. And, Telematics Update, being a worldwide publication picked it up. Telematics Update’s website doesn’t scream “this is a worldwide publication” and you might not even notice unless you note that it hosts “World News” “Africa News” and “America News” on its main page. So, no shame on MP2K on picking up the news and linking to the article.

Even though the Web can flatten geography/time/space/news, we do need to respect that worldwide companies may still wish to do different things in different geographies. Moreover, press releases are simply not the only way “news” gets out.

Special thanks to Rob Carter (UK) and Ashley Johnson (US) at Waggener Edstrom Worldwide (Worldwide - get it?) for their help on this matter.