Podcast: Mapping Broadband
By Joe Francica
, Editor-in-Chief and Vice Publisher, Directions Magazine
February 24, 2009
Classified Ads:
If you are still wondering which mobile GPS you should buy for your GIS data collection and mapping projects: Download our white paper to see how our MobileMapper 6 GPS beats the competition with better accuracy and lower price. Visit Magellan ProfessionalThe economic recession is on everyone's mind. Last week's passage of the stimulus bill, aka the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, was a bit vague on spending for specific projects involving geospatial technology... except one: mapping broadband. What exactly will that entail and what possible impact will it have on the expansion of communications in rural areas, LBS and wider dissemination of geospatial information? Listen now...
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Show Notes
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Your Comments Post a comment All comments provided in this section are those of the individual who has created the post. These are not the opinions of Directions Media, its editors, staff or owners unless otherwise noted. Directions Media retains the right to edit or delete any comments posted herein.
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| Good and bad story here: The good - yes, broadband is good, and so is a nice map. However, the entire $350mil is NOT for a map. Here's the actual text, with my *asterix* on either side of a very important word - ""$350,000,000 shall establish the State Broadband Data and Development Grant program, as authorized by Public Law 110-385 *and* for the development and maintenance of a national broadband inventory map as authorized by division B of this Act."" That says a map will be paid for out of the $350mil for support to 110-385, not that the Feds are spending all of the $350mil on a map. Which is good, because $350 mil on a map like that would be an extravagant waste of taxpayer dollars to assemble a national parcels layer (where the people are) and overlay the vendor engineering drawings (where the wires and wireless is). That could be done for $3.5mil or less, if Sean Gorman was given the opportunity. Or $35mil if ESRI got the job. Your pick where you want the money to go...personally, I'd choose GeoCommons to map the results of a national parcel inventory program. The hard part in this will be, as ever, in retrieving the competitive market intelligence (aka maps) from Verizon, Comcast, TimeWarner, etc. to assemble the map. That's likely to be very, very difficult. The 'cast also speaks to the ubiquity of mobile apps in disaster response. Yes. This is a good use for technology...provided there's wireless, of course. Assuming there is, the idea that someone would wait until a disaster happens to download a reference map misses the point on well-run mobile applications. Generally-accepted practice in mobile mapping programs is to load the reference products through network connections in advance...then share the smallest-size overlay vector possible to accomodate intermittent and unreliable connections. [And don't think that investment in more towers and capacity will solve this. Total bandwidth is always shared...when you have lots of folks working off a limited number of gateways/towers, the throughput shrinks. Just check your office web connections at lunchtime when folks are cruising the online stores for validation of that.] Not to mention that tornadoes and hurricanes and widespread disaster-induced power outages make wireless tools an iffy proposition...so most folks with experience back up their tech-toys with map books. So - good story on broadband, and great that 'someone' was able to convince the powers that be that a map might be a good idea. Whether that map is achievable, or the rollout of broadband is viable, remains to be seen. Here's hoping. |
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| Someone needs to talk to these people [Connected Nation, a non-profit that "expands access to and use of broadband Internet and the related technologies"]. I helped them get started a number of years ago and their work has played an important role in getting people connected. http://www.connectednation.com/index.php |
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| [Connected Nation] just spoke at NSGIC as part of a session on Broadband Deployment and mapping. We invite the organization to share its insights with Directions readers. |
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| One of the big problems here is that many times the fiber providers themselves do not know where their fiber is. Several have gone through GIS modernization projects to try and digitize the data, but many still operate with paper maps and much data has just been lost. It has been a while since I've really dug into it but that was the state of affairs in 2003/2004. I'd guess a good bit of the grant money will be needed for data creation. That said I think there are some far more efficient ways of doing and managing the process based on experiences with OpenStreetMap and other data collection projects with a variety of potential stakeholders and data contributors. I was curious if anyone had a contact at ConnectedNation? Would be interesting to get their thoughts. thanks, sean |
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