Where 2.0 - This is not your father’s GIS conference

O’Reilly Media’s first Where 2.0 conference in San Francisco illustrated one key fact: GIS people are welcome so long as you leave your desktop mapping software at the door. This was not your father’s GIS conference nor was is supposed to be. But the GIS vendors were here sniffing curiously at the consumer mapping phenonmenon that is rapidly impinging on their space.

Where 2.0 might be an introduction for the hackers and serious software developers new to the mapping technology sector, but make no mistake, there are some very different applications being demonstrated. Some examples:

Stamen Design - worked with MoveOn.org to help them visualize online town meetings. When attendees logged into the meeting, they were asked to give their zip code. From there, polling of attendees resulted in a map showing responses from which MoveOn then talored specific messages.

Magic Window - application that is kind of a "looking glass" whereby a tablet is equipped with GPS and a smart, transparent display that is being tested with firefighters in mind. In a smoke filled room, the display will show the user the actual walls and other features of the building. As the user moves, the display updates the location to continuously show building features. If you point the display upwards while standing inside a building, it is likely to show you constellations of the night sky.

PlaceSite uses a Wi-Fi router so that your typical wireless cafe patron can talk to others doing the same and not just within the same cafe but potentially in other cafes, worldwide.

More thoughts in the following blogs…