[HOT] Fwd: [CrisisMappers] Egypt + Tunisia + Jordan + ?

Joseph Reeves iknowjoseph at gmail.com
Sun Jan 30 15:03:50 GMT 2011


>I don't think Spot will be that helpful beyond what we have with Bing.  Everywhere I've checked, medium-size and smaller cities >throughout Egypt have great Bing imagery.

The one exception within the area mentioned by Nicolas is Amman, which
currently not covered by Bing imagery. This is probably not a priority
at the moment, but could be potentially be an issue in the future.

Cheers, Joseph




On 30 January 2011 14:51, Katie Filbert <filbertk at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 9:40 AM, nicolas chavent <nicolas.chavent at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>>
>> Hi there-
>>
>> I found the below thread in Crisis Mappers about Egypt and Tunisia and
>> mapping political crisis interesting.
>> On our side, I think that the answer is just supporting the continuation
>> of the OSM project in those territories with as always the question about
>> the level of resources we can invest in this.
>
> It would be a shame if we didn't devote significant effort to improving OSM
> coverage, given the outstanding Bing imagery.  Let's support our OSM mappers
> there. (and hope they are safe!)
>
>
>>
>> Most of the reported actions happening in the heart of the major cities
>> this can lead to improving the mapping of those cities.
>
> Cairo is already mapped quite good.  The slum areas not as well, but Midan
> Tahrir is good... good enough and really can only be improved with on the
> ground mapping. (POIs, etc.)
>
>
>>
>> It's unlikely that our classic outreach actions towards vector data will
>> be successful to bring in good open vector data, perhaps we can get more
>> luck with Spot on imagery if yahoo and bing can be complemented.
>
> I don't think Spot will be that helpful beyond what we have with Bing.
> Everywhere I've checked, medium-size and smaller cities throughout Egypt
> have great Bing imagery.
>
> -Katie
>
>
>>
>> Any thoughts?
>> Ciao
>>
>> Nicolas
>>
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: nicolas chavent <nicolas.chavent at gmail.com>
>> Date: Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 3:31 PM
>> Subject: Re: [CrisisMappers] Egypt + Tunisia + Jordan + ?
>> To: crisismappers at googlegroups.com
>>
>>
>> Hi there-
>>
>> Thanks for those who initiated and contributed to this thread which brings
>> in the front the key questions that CM as a community has to consider when
>> it comes to mapping conflicts or complex emergencies.
>>
>> The below are some thoughts inspired by the situation in Tunisia and
>> Egypt, I am speaking here only on my name and the below positions are not
>> the one of HOT.
>>
>> Tunisia, Egypt and Jordan call for maps by the CM network and I see no
>> reason why this call shall not be answered. Conflicts or complex emergencies
>> are in the scope of CM and all the points developed in the above thread
>> apply to mapping happening in such a context and as such applies also for
>> mapping in Pakistan or the the on-going mapping ongoing now in South Sudan.
>> None of those points were raised in those 2 crisis. By mapping Flooding in
>> Pakistan opens for the same question raised for Tunisia and Egypt, Pakistan
>> being a complex emergency. The same applies for South Sudan. No questions
>> raised and on our side an interestting mapping work done or in the making.
>> Why acting differently in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan or other countries from the
>> Magrheb/ Mashrek?
>>
>> Generally,in front of a conflict, CM is expected or has to create open
>> baseline maps (transportation, hydro, boundary), open humanitarian baseline
>> maps (warehouses, camps, bladder, mobile clinics) and maps of fluid
>> situational facts (violence incidents, road blocks, protests, events ...).
>> Classic mapping techniques and crowd sourced approaches will be mobilized
>> within our network under openness as our operational paradigm: the crisis
>> will be mapped by the crowd for the crowd, the crowd being any individual or
>> group interested/ and or active for the territory struck by the crisis, this
>> mapping will happen as the result of coordinated or uncoordinated actions by
>> remote and on-site entities. OSM and ushaidi furnishing 2 paradigms of
>> baseline and situational mapping by the crowd. The resulting maps are not
>> going to be perfect, depicting accurately, timely and in a an "objective"
>> fashion the reality of the crisis. We know from the experience that with the
>> time and with participation, those maps will be portray ok the reality and
>> will be usable assets for those on the ground or afar who are working on the
>> territories hit by the crisis.
>>
>> Sure mapping political crisis is a complex task (just think about the
>> enormous academic literature on this subject by academics and practitioners)
>> with implications, "no undo buttons", where mapping enters into politics.
>> This did not prevent us from mapping in territories hit by conflicts or
>> conflict prone (Pakistan and South Sudan). Are we going to have a different
>> stand on Tunisia and Egypt and wait for digesting this complex and
>> literature? The value of CM lies in its mix of people belonging to all those
>> realms (academics, practitioners, social media activists, software
>> developers etc etc ), an empiricist approach when it comes to learning, did
>> not we learn from doing over the past years in the many crisis iterations?
>>
>> My point here is that T, E and any country affected by a crisis deserves
>> action on our end, that we will not start from nothing in terms of awareness
>> about what mapping a crisis implies and that we will keep learning and
>> contributing hopefully in a significant manner to the literature academic
>> and operational about conflict/ complex emergency mapping by being active in
>> this field.
>>
>> The questions ahead of us are more on how CM can respond this call given
>> that there are for each crisis tech issues and procedures issues for this
>> and that resources are not infinite.
>> Is it an objective for this group to ensure at the occurrence of each
>> crisis the infrastructure for this mapping (baseline maps and situational
>> facts) to happen with a first remote activation that can be then handed over
>> on the ground to individuals and groups active throughout the crisis and
>> willing to maintain it the way that both OSM and USHAIDI (in a more easy
>> context) acted in Haiti with a hand over to C-OSM.HA (Communaute
>> OpenStreetMap Haiti) and Noula.
>>
>> This being said, like some intervening in the thread, I have almost no
>> time to devote to Tunisia and Egypt, but most happy to support even
>> minmially those who would stand up and strengthen the existing crowd map
>> efforts mentioned in the thread.
>>
>> I'd be also very interested in hearing about a crowd sourced mapping
>> project to keep track of the political violences in Ivory Coast which is
>> made necessary by the level of tensions on the ground and the real risk of a
>> large scale political regional crisis.
>>
>> I look forward to the continuation of this thread and to any answers or
>> pointers on Ivory Coast
>>
>> Thanks and best
>>
>> Nicolas
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Jan 29, 2011 at 4:21 AM, Leesa Astredo <leesaastredo at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> I feel that as a global community, it is imperative that we get
>>> "involved" in all issues of the world. Isn't that why we all are here? To
>>> inform the world? Good, Bad or indifferent. Our "clients" are global. If it
>>> affects them, it should be addressed by us. IMHO. @viequesbound
>>>
>>> On Fri, Jan 28, 2011 at 12:44 PM, John Crowley <bostoncello at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> This comment brings up a very good question for the community: when
>>>> getting "involved" with conflicts and political movements, what is our
>>>> stance on neutrality? Does CM get involved in supporting the efforts of a
>>>> particular side? If so, what effects will such advocacy--or perception of
>>>> advocacy--have on future efforts on our work in hard places?
>>>> These are hard questions to be contemplated carefully.
>>>> John
>>>>
>>>> On Fri, Jan 28, 2011 at 9:46 AM, omDesign <omdesign.is at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> I think it's well within the mandate of Crisis mappers and the SBTF to
>>>>> get more involved with the Egyptian and Tunisian upheaval.
>>>>>
>>>>> I have seen the http://25jan.crowdmap.com/ Jan 25 crowdmap but with
>>>>> democracy on the line and likelihood of violence the need and rationale
>>>>> exists for translation/coordination/ and people first support measures.
>>>>>
>>>>> Om
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
>>>>> Groups "CrisisMappers" group.
>>>>> To post to this group, send email to crisismappers at googlegroups.com.
>>>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
>>>>> crisismappers+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>>>>> For more options, visit this group at
>>>>> http://groups.google.com/group/crisismappers?hl=en.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> ______________________________
>>>> John Crowley
>>>> Harvard Humanitarian Initiative &
>>>> National Defense University/Center for Tech and National Security Policy
>>>> STAR-TIDES initiative (contractor)
>>>> jcrowley at post.harvard.edu
>>>> bostoncello at gmail.com
>>>> mobile: +1 617.784.3663
>>>> skype: johnrcrowley
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
>>>> Groups "CrisisMappers" group.
>>>> To post to this group, send email to crisismappers at googlegroups.com.
>>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
>>>> crisismappers+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>>>> For more options, visit this group at
>>>> http://groups.google.com/group/crisismappers?hl=en.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Leesa Astredo
>>> www.info4disasters.com
>>>
>>>
>>> My blogs
>>> http://gulfoilspill.blogspot.com/
>>>
>>> http://hurricane-2010.blogspot.com/
>>>
>>> http://viequesbound4haiti.blogspot.com
>>> http://severeweatherinformation.blogspot.com
>>>
>>> twitter at viequesbound @info4disasters
>>> Skype name: viequesbound
>>>
>>> --
>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
>>> "CrisisMappers" group.
>>> To post to this group, send email to crisismappers at googlegroups.com.
>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
>>> crisismappers+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>>> For more options, visit this group at
>>> http://groups.google.com/group/crisismappers?hl=en.
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Nicolas Chavent
>> Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team
>> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti
>> Mobile (Haiti): +509 389 583 05
>> Mobile (France): +33 6 89 45 54 58
>> Landline (FRA): +33 2 97 26 23 08
>> Email: nicolas.chavent at gmail.com
>> Skype: c_nicolas
>> Twitter: nicolas_chavent
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Nicolas Chavent
>> Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team
>> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Haiti
>> Mobile (Haiti): +509 389 583 05
>> Mobile (France): +33 6 89 45 54 58
>> Landline (FRA): +33 2 97 26 23 08
>> Email: nicolas.chavent at gmail.com
>> Skype: c_nicolas
>> Twitter: nicolas_chavent
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> HOT mailing list
>> HOT at openstreetmap.org
>> http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Katie Filbert
> filbertk at gmail.com
> @filbertkm
>
> _______________________________________________
> HOT mailing list
> HOT at openstreetmap.org
> http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot
>
>



More information about the HOT mailing list