[OSM-talk-be] OSM presentation on Tuesday 19th March

[Julien Fastré]

Hi !

I would like to discuss with the list some ideas I had for the OSM's
presentation of next Tuesday.

I apologize for the lack of discussion and information about this
activity. Having a child, a pregnant wife, two professionnal activities
and volunteers engagements doesn't help.

For this presentation, I would like to talk about subject I know better
than others. But I do not consider myself as a specialist for them.
Correct me if required !

This is the plan of my presentation. I am going to prepare an ODP this
week-end.

The theme of the day is "Open Data: Mythe ou réalité ?" (Open Data, myth
or reality ?) The title of the presentation is "when open data helps
OSM, when OSM helps citizens and companies". It will be in French, a
language I practice with more ease than Dutch and English :-)

Could you read the schema of the presentation and tell me what do you
think ?
I have also two questions: do you know how much contributors exist in
Belgium ? Or, for a more precise question: do you know how much
contributors made more than two or three edits in Belgium ? (I consider
that a contributors with only one or two edit is not a regular one...)

This is the scheme of the presentation :

1. a short presentation of OSM

1.1 "OSM is the "wikipedia of the map". At first, it is a geographical
database. There are less restrictions in modifying the database (you
must have an account and an access to Internet). The data may be re-used
and modified as long as you attribute, share-alike and keep open the DB
(see http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/summary/)"

1.2 OSM is an ecosystem: the community developped a lot of tools for
improving the quality of the data: tools to enter data, quality tools
(Osmosis, osminspector, etc.), some tools to coordinate the action
(wiki, mailing-lists, etc.)

1.3 In Belgium, the sources of the data are Bing, gps track, and the
time and contributions of many volunteers. The coverage is quite good.

1.4 Abroad, a lot of countries could improve the quality of the data
thanks to open geographical data.

2. I speak then about one experience in France: the cadastre (because it
is one I know the best; it may be not the more talkative: help me if not...)

2.1 a little history
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_Cadastre_Fran%C3%A7ais/Conditions_d%27utilisation#Petit_rappel_historique

So, the cadastre give the authorization to be re-used in OSM, and opens
a WMS server... So people enjoy !

2.2 some tools were developped for importing the data: a josm plugin,
etc.  A coordination was made (a "source" tag, etc.)

2.3 There were some problems with the imports : some people imported
data upon existing data; etc. This was a tricky job.

2.4 It brings also good things to OSM: a better quality, new
contributors, a better visibility and, at least, an OSMFR association
was founded.

2.5 Open data brings more open data. in France, some cities open data
(Rennes, etc.) . A portal was opened, a licence was chosed, etc.

2.6 What can we retain ?
- the necessity of a comprehensible licence ;
- the use of standards format ease open data, the persistency of the
format too (I saw on a blog a post that a company had to re-develop a
script to exploit open data because updated data was published in a new
XML format) ;
- accessibility and low restriction ease too ;

3. When OSM profit to citizens

3.1 In Belgium, some companies use OSM data, but do not communicate
about that. We have heard about GeoDynamics, etc. Those companies does
not have a lot of contacts with OSM community. This could be good for
the community that they develop some strategy for Open Gis projects.

3.2 Abroad, some companies have developped a strategy to use open data:
cloudmade, maptools, etc.

3.3 In France, 3Liz and Geovelo sell products with opendata (I know
Geovelo the best, being a cyclist)

3.4 For citizens, there are a lot of uses: a lot of maps, etc.

3.5 Association may reuse open data. For instance, with the GRACq, we
are thinking about heat map to analyze the opportunity of creating new
bikelanes.



So, what do you think ?

Julien Fastré