Esri Confirms 400 million user-gen maps on ArcGIS.com in October

Today many in the geotwittersphere were excited about a tweet from Tim O’Reilly.

Down at ESRI, getting killer demo of arcgis.com. In October, 400 million user-generated maps on the site! Growing exponentially.

Some found that stat too high. Sean Gorman of FortiusOne tweeted:

ESRI seriously wants us to believe that 400 million maps were made on ArcGIS.com in a month? There are only 344 million internet users in NA

One of Gorman’s colleagues, Andrei Taraschuk looked at Compete.com, a site analytics tool, and tweeted:

According to @timoreilly, arcgis.com grew by 400M maps in October - that adds to about 12,500 maps per visitor http://bit.ly/eRTaM0

I contacted Esri to confirm Mr. O’Reilly didn’t mishear or mistweet. The 400 million number for October was indeed correct.

I found this tweet from a follower of Mr. O’Reilly, Ian Wilker, interesting, too.

just learned of arcgis.com via @timoreilly — whoah. Web-friendly GIS. Been waiting for something like this for years. Looks revolutionary.”

USGS Announces The National Map Users Conference and USGS Geographic Information Science (GIS) Workshop

USGS wants you to know:

To better interact with users of The National Map and to work with science-related GIS professionals, we are happy to announce a Users Conference to be held May 10-13, 2011 in Lakewood, Colo.

Currently, we are issuing a Call for Abstracts.  Since we want to encourage dialog among our user community, the conference agenda will be largely determined by accepted abstracts.

- press release

Navigating the Store Floor…with your Tablet Computer

Jeff Pierce at Seeking Alpha had this prediction for mobile advertising. He said, "As strange as it might sound, I expect shopping carts to have a place to snap your tablet in place for easy navigation throughout the store. Opportunities for sales items and discounts will increase. Having your shopping list input before arrival will allow it to steer you directly to the right aisle." His opinion appeared in an article entitled "The Future Mobile Advertising Revolution."

There have been a few predictions in the past about "mapping the store floor" and hyperlocal mobile advertising. His prediction seems to marry the two concepts. It also makes the one big assumption that everyone will be carrying a tablet computer in the future. So, when "tabs" become commodities (next year?), his assumptions may prove true. But here's another thing that has to fall into place: sensor networks.

I have often envisioned that sensors will drive consumers to buy certain items by offering coupons as they pass by an end-cap, for example, because an offer popped up on the screen that accompanies the shopping cart. Now, with tablets, I can envision that they will be used in the next generation of grocery stores; let's call it the e-grocery store, where the floor is mapped and the has sensors to capture traffic patterns and to sell ad space. Coupons pop up on tablets alongside your grocery list which as been synched to a route within to store that gets you in and out the fastest. It's a wonderful dream...it could happen.

MMA to Update its Privacy Vision

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA, a group I just barely am aware of) said Monday it will develop a new set of privacy guidelines. The group has an Global Code of Conduct that cover eight types of mobile media: SMS, MMS, email, voice, applications, mobile Internet, content and location-based services.

- MediaPost
- press release

Patent Infringement Tidbits

James Fee dug up that Manifold is being sued by a well-known patent troll. The company is among a long list in a Uniloc press release.

- press release (Nov 2010) via James Fee Blog

Taiwan-based GPS portable navigation device maker Mitac International filed lawsuit against Taiwan-based PND software designer Maction, accusing Maction to have violated two of its patents. Maction, by the way, is developing pedestrian routing using wi-fi for Taiwan.

- DigiTimes