How do I know? It's the headline for an upcoming Nokia N82 firmware upgrade: "New, yet to be released, Nokia N82 firmware to include geotagging ..." I can't quite figure out this comment from the post: "Privacy advocates hold your horses, I'm sure this will be turned off by default."

- IntoMobile

The technology, a result of a partnership between Case Western Reserve and Bowling Green, uses a mobile device to explore photograph-based virtual worlds. There's no GPS, nor Wi-Fi used, as I understand it, for the navigation of the worlds. It's not clear how the datasets are knit together. Even if I don't quite follow how it works, the New Media Consortium identified it as one of six emerging technologies in its 2008 Horizon Report. The end use?

This three-dimensional photographic virtual world is likely to be introduced to higher education and specific organizations within the next five years.

- Pocket Virtual Worlds website (flash demo available)

- The BG News

At least it does in the Rocky Mountain News. The app is here (flash-based) Stories are color coded as news, sports, business or spotlight.

The research from the Zoological Society of London, the Wildlife Trust and Columbia University is published in Nature. (Payment needed to read the article itself, but a public news article covers the ideas and offers a small map.) The BBC has a different map.

Bottom line (from News-Medical.Net):

They have produced a detailed map highlighting the world's hotspots for emerging infectious diseases and the main hotspots are located in low latitude regions, like South Asia and
South-East Asia, which were not the financial focus of global funds to prevent the spread of EIDs.

Peter Daszak from the Wildlife Trust, says the world's public health resources are misallocated as most are focused on richer countries that can afford surveillance, when most of the hotspots are in developing countries.

Dr. John Gittleman from the University of Georgia describes the map as a "seminal moment in how we study emerging diseases".

I wonder if like the "human impact on the ocean map" this'll get buzz?

- News-Medical.Net

Our podcast this week spoke to the "popularity" at least in the world press of a new map of the human impact on the seas. It was announced in Science and at the AAAS meeting here in Boston. Another mapping thread at that meeting is about soil mapping. However, since there was no announcement of a map (there is data however), I suspect it won't get the buzz. My point, as we suggested in the podcast, if you want buzz, create a simply to understand/interpret global map. I hope I'm wrong and in part point this point because I want to be wrong!