Thursday, June 4. 2009

GeoEye-1 "Glitch" will not impact Revenues

Reuters reports that in an SEC filing GeoEye states that the limitations noted last month in the satellite sensor will not impact revenues. In the worst case scenario (the situation is still being researched) it might have a 5% impact. From a technical standpoint it will "not affect the ground resolution or mapping accuracy of imagery."

Update: LA Times Offers Neighborhood Map for Its Own and Your Use

Word from the LA Times that the map has now "arrived" at least for now. It includes 113 neighborhoods. Here's the article that the Times offers on its blog to introduce the map and an article from editor Doug Smith.

Will every paper from a city of seasonable size undertake this sort of project?

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Dallas Cowboys Execs: Turn off GPS, Google Maps and use Our Map to Stadium Lots

This weekend is the first time the new Dallas Cowboys stadium will see huge crowds. The opening concert is by George Strait. It's also the debut of the franchise's new parking map site that tries to offer fastest (if not shortest) routes and reminds users they are heading to parking lots, not the stadium itself.

It's a Flash-based solution that offers a simple line drawing of local streets with the route in or out of the lot highlighted. There are also text-based directions.

- Dallas Morning News

Using GPS to Keep Your Hybrid Cool and Efficient

In some hybrid cars, running in economy mode means the A/C turns off when the car engine does. So, some people are opting out of economy mode, which can defeat much of the cost and environmental savings of the vehicle. But fear not, geography to the rescue!

Ricardo's [automotive engineering firm in Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex, UK] system uses GPS to plot the car's position on a digital map that includes the location of traffic lights and junctions to anticipate when the engine, and the aircon, is likely to switch itself off. It then produces extra cool air to reduce the cabin temperature by a further 1.5 °C - not enough to make the passengers shiver, but enough to tide the vehicle over while it is stationary.

Using the system decreased fuel consumption by 9%.

- New Scientist

Numbeo: Aggregating User Generated Data

I (and apparently about 100 other journalists and outlets) received an e-mail from Mladen Adamovic introducing his new offering Numbeo. He's an ex-Google employee and notes that in his communication: "How expensive is your city? Former Google employee makes an analyzing software." It's unclear if this is a hobby site or a commercial effort, but the terms of use are wide open, though data use requires attribution. There's also a big warning that the data may not be accurate and hasn't been reviewed by humans. Work planned for this summer aims to identify "incorrect data."

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