Wednesday, February 25. 2009

Update: Tenlinks: Questex Divests Cadalyst

Update 2/25/09: WorldCAD Access reports Cadalyst will live on, now as part of licensing deal to Longitude Media (very geographic!), lead by ex-CMP (they owned Cadence, a competitor) Seth Nichols. All involved will keep their jobs. Here's the official statement.

--- original post 2/13/09 ----
Tenlinks today reports that Questex Media will no longer publish the last remaining print publication focussed only on CAD, Cadalyst. The company will pay employees until the end of February. A team from the magazine is looking to buy the property and continue publishing. Questex is also the parent company of Geospatial Solutions, GPS World and Sensors.

Microsoft Sues TomTom over Navigation/File Management Patent Infringement

Microsoft has tried to engage TomTom in licensing the patents for over a year with no luck, so the time has come to go to court. This is just the third time Microsoft has gone to court to allege patent infringement (the company been on the other end of such suits, however).

There are two separate filing alleging infringement of eight patents, five related to navigation and three to file management. ITWire reports the file management patents are key parts of TomTom's implementation of the Linux kernel. The filings are before the U.S. District Court in Washington and the International Trade Commission. The former are aimed at gaining payment for damage, the latter to block future imports of infringing products.

This is not a good time for TomTom to have to go court; the company warned this week it may default on its debt incurred to acquire Tele Atlas. (MarketWatch)

Update 2/26/09: Thursday morning TomTom "rejected" the claims without elaborating. (Dow Jones)

- C|net

INRIX PR Firms Uses Location with Interesting Results!

I just received the "social media package" from Weber Shandwick (PR) on the second annual traffic scorecard put out by traffic company INRIX. (press release) The package is nice and includes some interactive maps and a video on the findings. Bottom line: " a more than 30 percent decline in traffic throughout the US."

A moment later I received another news alert from Weber Shandwick. This time highlighting that "Chicago 3rd Worst City for Traffic." The short e-mail provided the top ten list with Chicago indeed at number three and included gory details on that city's traffic along with a pointer to the study noted above.

Why did the PR firm send me info on Chicago? Because Directions Media's mailing address is in Illinois. That, the PR logic goes, means our publication covers local news (we don't) and thus would want to feature the nearby big city (we don't). So, it's great the PR industry is being spatial. It just doesn't always work.

Lowenstein: The future of LBS is not subscription services

Mark Lowenstein writing at Fierce Wireless is trying to be upbeat about LBS, but really he isn't. "I am not optimistic that there is a large market for subscription-based LBS." That said, he does look at the four primary ways in which location services can be monetized as the industry goes forward:

app store (free/paid divided)
LBS as part of advertising/social networks
search
packaging of where user go (for multiple uses)

This is a nice reality check.

Complete Map of China Found at School Site Demolished by Earthquake

The earthquake destroyed the school and neighboring buildings, but left the map, painted on a ceramic wall was left intact. Some suggest it be part of the memorial for the May 12 quake that killed 1000 students at Beichuan High School.

- China.org

The National Map: Quad Sheet Factory

Mark DeMulder of USGS briefed NSGIC on The National Map this week. He started with why the program exists, citing three basic reasons:

- serves info to decision makers
- supports our science mission of USGS too
- cross-jurisdictional maps are useful in emergencies

He then moved on to what The National Map got from the Stimulus Bill. Right now, it looks like the program will receive $15 million to add to its typical $60 million budget.

He went on to focus on basically one use of The National Map that’ll start showing itself in the coming months: electronic topo quads.

Continue reading "The National Map: Quad Sheet Factory"