GIS and the Influence of Neogeography

Jim Baumann
ESRI
380 New York Street
Redlands, CA 92373-8100
United States
jbaumann@esri.com

Consumer-oriented map visualization applications, such as Google Earth, Microsoft Virtual Earth, and others, contribute significantly to increasing the general understanding of geography and geographic awareness.

However, GIS methodology takes a map far beyond the simple physical view and provides unique insight by layering information—by drilling down and making visual connections about an area that are impossible to comprehend by conventional means. GIS is a unique tool for synthesizing information because it can correlate data that seemingly has no relationship—data connected by location alone.

The Rise of Volunteered Geographic Information

Digital map viewers provide scenes of the entire planet that have helped reignite an interest in geography worldwide. An aerial view of our home or place of business and the surrounding areas, for example, provides us with an expanded view of our community geography and helps us better understand even those things that are very familiar to us. Other products, like automobile navigation systems and computer-based travel map programs, also play an important role in sustaining our interest and abilities in basic geographic reckoning. The amount of geographic data available from these applications is extensive. And, the variety of users of these applications is equally extensive, ranging from anyone with a little curiosity about a particular location to a professional researcher.

Volunteered geographic information (VGI) is another manifestation of the rising interest of the layperson in compiling georeferenced data. This is considered an assertive method of collecting geospatial information as opposed to the authoritative method that government agencies and private industry employ to collect data. The wiki-genre site Wikimapia is a good example of VGI. It encourages participants to post comments about georeferenced locations. On the Flickr Web site, users can upload photos related to specific locations, while OpenStreetMap is an international effort to create a free source of map data through the efforts of volunteers.

Says Jack Dangermond, president of ESRI, “While much of the current VGI on the Web represents casual observations or assertions about a place (e.g., the neogeography phenomenon), conceptually speaking, VGI can also be data collected by traditional authoritative source organizations and agencies and shared openly on the Web. This is basically the GIS concept of spatial data infrastructure [SDI], where multiple organizations share their data and services with each other across the Web.”

Emerging Technologies Provide Greater Opportunities for Analysis and Understanding

GIS is a sophisticated technology with a rich information model and data management infrastructure. It integrates thousands of tools for cartography, visualization, and spatial analysis and supports many forms of customization for a variety of workflows. The Web mapping/visualization tools developed by Google and Microsoft provide very fast, easy-to-access views of images and maps. These viewers are highly optimized for rapid search and display but are not suited for the more complex work commonly performed by those using a full GIS.

KML, Google’s markup language for geographic data, was adopted by the Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc. as a standard. A wide range of applications can create and consume KML, and these files can be found via Web search. This allows people to easily perform simple mashups for their own interest and use.

ESRI’s new ArcGIS Server 9.3 improves on the ability to author and publish KML-enabled services. The ArcGIS user can now publish data for standard client viewing applications such as Google Earth, Google Maps, and Microsoft Virtual Earth. This allows the mashup of information-rich GIS databases with the extensive basemaps hosted by Google and Microsoft. In addition, ArcGIS Server 9.3 publishes service directories, which store, organize, and provide access to information in HTML that can be indexed by Web search engines, allowing another way to discover and present data. Also, the new ArcGIS Server JavaScript, REST, and Flex APIs released by ESRI allow users to mash up Web content with GIS services.

Engineering the technologies like ArcGIS and Google Earth to leverage each other provides interoperable benefits for both the GIS professional and the occasional viewer. For example, GIS users could use VGI data to supplement their analysis and data compilation efforts or associate the observational information with other data layers for query and enrichment of the GIS. Geotagged photos could be used to enrich the multimedia dimension of a GIS, and local government could include VGI comments in public policy debates.

“Geospatial data and tools are essential in almost everything we do as humans, and over the past few years they have become accessible to virtually all of us on the well-endowed side of the digital divide,” says Michael F. Goodchild, professor of geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara. “We have seen volunteer initiatives such as Map Action and the GIS Corps playing an important role in disaster response, and other volunteer activities are providing open sources of basic map information in communities that have never previously had access.”