Remote Sensing and GEOINT

Google has not only become the de facto mapping app, the de facto navigation app, the de facto remote sensing app, the de facto change detection app, etc. It's the de facto National Map, as well. The USGS collected the data (imagery, topo, etc.) but Google monetized it. Is this an acceptable model where the government invests but the private sector monetizes the data? What is the future of privatization of national geodata?

Social media. It can be a great resource, a time sink or a burden for geospatial professionals. What exactly makes a geo individual or organization worth “following” via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or Google+? We’ll share who we follow and try to identify the best practices that make their posts valuable.

Three university programs have made announcements about the future of GIS education. Two schools are working closely with GIS software vendors while a third is implementing a self-study lab complete with badges to show achievement. Are these positive trends? Will they be repeated at other schools?

Have you ever wanted to see the view from the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania? Google is making that possible — sending employees up the world's highest peaks with digital cameras, tripods and fisheye lenses to take photos that can be stitched together for a 360 degree view. Image Luca Galuzzi - www.galuzzi.it under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/deed.en

Drones on top of drones. New, commercial drones take off. Some say our skies will be dark with privately-owned drones.

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Two Google-funded reports on the size and nature of the geospatial industry, globally and in the U.S., use very different methodologies than past studies. Overall revenue figures are ten times those documented in the past! What did past studies miss, if anything? And, more importantly, what do these reports tell us about our industry?

This got geoint? podcast, brought to you by trajectory magazine, features the publication of

The National Research Council released a report titled

License plate identification, picture-taking drones and GPS tracking devices are legal in certain cases and their users may have only the best of intentions. So, what could possibly go wrong if these tools are deployed for purposes other than those for which they were intended? Welcome to the new privacy.