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<p wrap="">Hi,<br>
<br>
as I am another candidate for the board election that runs from
today until<br>
July 9th I would like to append this post by my manifesto that
represents my<br>
view and thoughts on OpenStreetMap. A brief personal overview can
be found<br>
here [1].<br>
<br>
I would also like to refer to the overview and process for this
election:<br>
[2]. Please note that you can vote for up to three candidates.<br>
<br>
Best Regards,<br>
Oliver<br>
<br>
[1] <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Oliver.kuehn">http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Oliver.kuehn</a><br>
[2] <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Foundation/AGM10/Election_to_Board">http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Foundation/AGM10/Election_to_Board</a><br>
<br>
<b>Oliver's OSMF Board Election 2010 Manifesto<br>
<br>
Introduction</b><br>
<br>
OpenStreetMap is a fantastic project. It attracts more and more<br>
contributors. The map coverage is developing fast, shows an
immense dynamic<br>
and gains a very interesting level of details in specific areas.
While the<br>
contributors and the map coverage is growing fast, the usage of<br>
OpenStreetMap data lacks behind. Most users that just want to
"consume" a<br>
map go to sources like Google Maps while many companies that are
interested<br>
in OpenStreetMap data remain hesitant because they are feeling
insecure in<br>
regards of the share-a-like license. For me it seems like that
part of the<br>
OpenStreetMap potential remains untapped.<br>
<br>
<b>My ultimate aim</b><br>
<br>
My ultimate aim is to help that the OpenStreetMap project unfolds
its own<br>
ecosystem by discovering and claiming its (market) segment in the
digital<br>
mapping turf - regardless if it is special interest maps,
outstanding<br>
detailed coverage or whatever. I want to help that OpenStreetMap
becomes a<br>
viable alternative in the Open Geo stack when users, developers or
companies<br>
need a digital map. My intention is to help that OpenStreetMap
achieves the<br>
acceptance and respect it deserves among developers and companies
so that an<br>
ecosystem can evolve.<br>
<br>
<b>What change</b><br>
<br>
There are three specific goals that I want to pursue:<br>
<br>
(1) Improve the communication among mappers, companies,
developers: Make<br>
transparent for which use cases the map is appropriate, where its
strengths<br>
and weaknesses are by ?decrypting? the license, providing better
information<br>
and statistics about the map coverage as well as the available map<br>
attributes. From my discussions I know that many companies are
interested in<br>
using OpenStreetMap but remain reluctant as they fear that
proprietary data<br>
will become ?public data?. On the other hand many people consider
OSM as a<br>
playground for techies as they have taken their last closer look
at the map<br>
more than 18 months ago and this impression still prevails.<br>
<br>
(2) Help to identify a spot in the digital mapping turf that gives
the<br>
OpenStreetMap project a long-term perspective and builds upon the
strengths<br>
of OpenStreetMap. Most activities in the OSM community are related
to the<br>
fun stuff like mapping, inventing new map attributes or coding
software<br>
solutions related to OSM. While the OpenStreetMap project attracts
more and<br>
more users, most activities are not crosschecked against a
long-term<br>
strategy. Many values have been established in the OpenStreetMap
community<br>
and there seems to be something in the air, which makes all the
active<br>
contributors belief in the project. However, the vision, mission
and values<br>
need to be distilled and transformed into words so that they
become explicit<br>
and serve as guideline for short- and mid-term decisions as well
as to<br>
inspire even more people to join the OpenStreetMap project as
active<br>
contributors.<br>
<br>
(3) Protect the OpenStreetMap project from exploitation by large
companies.<br>
There is a lot of money at stake: Nokia paid $8.1 billion for
Navteq, TomTom<br>
paid €1.8 billion for TeleAtlas. The map maker acquisitions during
2007 led<br>
to fact that there no more independent commercial map makers on a
global<br>
scale. Many players have now to purchase map data licenses from
their<br>
fiercest competition. Due to this situation there are many
companies out<br>
there that are interested in having their own map. In the US
market there is<br>
the Tiger data set, which has been used to build a digital map
database. The<br>
situation is different in Europe and other places on the world
where such a<br>
free "raw database" does not exist. It is an act of balance to
protect the<br>
IP on the one hand and to encourage the use of the OpenStreetMap
data on the<br>
other hand. Therefore it needs significant attention. Since the<br>
OpenStreetMap data are a scarce resource in many places of the
world these<br>
data need to be protected against exploitations. While others
would like to<br>
see OpenStreetMap as public domain, I am a supporter for well
balanced<br>
license. <br>
</p>
<br>
<br>
On 01.07.2010 19:25, Emilie Laffray wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:AANLkTimbPM0ChGsSldo4yKENJSLCceHpOGH8rK9Ex1LU@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">Hello,<br>
<br>
I am writing to the list to mention that I will be running for the
board for the upcoming election for the foundation. After lot of
thinking, I have decided that I could potentially contribute to
the community in a different way in order to help OSM achieve its
goal.<br>
I am including my manifesto at the end of that email. <br>
<br>
Emilie Laffray<br>
<br>
<br>
<b>OSMF Board 2010</b><br>
<br>
<b>Introduction</b><br>
I started getting involved in OpenStreetMap in Automn 2008 where I
spent most of my time looking at understanding how it worked
before finally joining the site in 2009. My initial interest was
to find a free source of geographical data to remove the
proprietary data that my company (u-blox) was using.<br>
Since I started mapping, I added my hometown in France and did
most of the mapping North of Orleans, based on GPS tracks that I
did, and mostly on the cadastre (geographical data used for tax
purposes) which proved to be a very powerful tool to map France. <br>
I am involved in the English and French communities, and active on
many international mailing lists. I have also been involved in the
Corine Land Cover import in France, where I wrote most of the SQL
code to check for overlapping polygons to make sure that the
community wouldn't lose polygons for something that was of lower
quality.<br>
In addition, I have been getting involved with the organization of
the State Of The Map 2010 in Gerona, Spain.<br>
When I have the time and opportunity, I am also talking about
OpenStreetMap (OpenKnowledge Conference 2010, London and SIG La
Lettre 2010, Paris) on different topics like data quality and
Haiti.<br>
Being involved in the State Of The Map conference really gave me
the feeling that I could do more for OpenStreetMap, and it is one
reason for standing for election.<br>
<br>
<b>Statement</b><br>
I strongly believe that OpenStreetMap needs to communicate better
about the different projects that are currently being developed in
the different communities. Some projects are very good, but are
unfortunately restricted to one community only due to lack of
promotion of the tools being developped. In addition, it is clear
that some communities would beneficiate from the help of more
mature communities in order to help the mapping effort. While
English needs to stay the main language, it is a language that not
many people are necessarily speaking fluently and it is important
that bridges are built to work around those difficulties.<br>
<br>
<b>Goals</b><br>
If I get elected, I would like to push the following points:<br>
<br>
* Better communication from the Foundation<br>
* Better support of community projects<br>
* Better support to non English speaking communities<br>
* Working towards reducing the barrier of entry to mapping<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
</blockquote>
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