[OSM-talk] Crowdfunding for OpenStreetMap in Bénin : 275km² high resolution satellite imagery for Cotonou by 1-May 2016!

Enock Seth Nyamador kwadzo459 at gmail.com
Tue Apr 26 12:11:07 UTC 2016


Greetings,

Glad to see many views and comments coming up on this topic.

Best,

- Enock
​
OSMGhana
​ | ​
​
UMaT, Tarkwa
enockseth.github.io

On Tue, Apr 26, 2016 at 11:50 AM, nicolas chavent <nicolas.chavent at gmail.com
> wrote:

> Hi John,
>
> There is a local OSM group active in Benin since mid 2013,
> This group is skilled they got trained via (capacity building missions run
> by the collective Projet EOF) and had been always self training and growing
> their skills, growing their community and training Academic, Benin Red
> Cross Volunteers, Civil workers from local government, folks from the local
> tech scene etc...
> This group has a few equipments at hand,
> They share a co-working space (Blolab) in Cotonou with other tech actors,
> They have been active in their country (several places and various mapping
> project) and in Western Africa through regional 3 to 4 weeks long capacity
> building missions involving a lot of field and remote mapping work
> They operate mostly on a voluntary basis with low means and they grow
> their map and their community.
> They decided to crowdfund for these 275km2 high res imagery in Cotonou
> because this has been blocking them and that a few additional GPS Units
> will not make the difference, but this imagery will do!
>
> Since the Haiti quake, community empowerment is at the center of the
> agenda of humanitarian and development actors as shown by the Katmandu
> Living Lab experience in the Nepal Earthquake (praised in mainstream and
> professionals see The Guardian (1)) or a glance at the agenda of the World
> Humanitarian Summit will gather this coming May in Istambul. Benin (but
> also Sénégal, Mali, Togo, Burkina, Niger, Ivory Coast) show the example of
> organized OpenStreetMap collectives and communities. They are building
> their map and their community without the support of charities, or
> supporting charities, local / central government, academic, development/
> humanitarian actors.
>
> All this is happening in Western Africa as the result of capacity building
> programs that I started for HOT US Inc in July 2013 with the support of the
> Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF) and then since Fall
> 2013 outside of HOT US Inc within the collective Projet EOF (mixing folks
> from French speaking countries from the "north" & "south"). All those
> actions have been conceived and carried out with very low cost budget
> schemes (under which HOT US Inc decided not to operate) to support the
> emerging of local OSM communities and this has been working thanks to
> experienced persons (there are many of those in the ProjetEOF who by the
> way build the HOT Project and HOT US Inc in the early days) and
> enthusisasm.
>
> Now that a local OSM community like Benin is organized, why can't this
> community act autonomously, why should it resort to a charity to map their
> town? Why should it inform and discuss only in the hot mailing list and not
> on the talk list where the community life of OSM is happening? Your email
> cast doubts or rise questions about how a charity work with local
> communities, about partnerships and partners roles.
>
> With a true respect for local OSM communities groups, no doubt that there
> is some potential to fulfill from the projects you mentioned (and that are
> not new to OSM Bénin as well as Projet EOF folks), let's see realize that
> potential but not by speaking on top of those communities and by not
> recognizing their strengths.
>
> Distributing additional Digital Globe or Mapbox high resolution satellite
> imagery in other Areas Of Interest (AOIs) of Benin and Weestern Africa
> outside of those 275 km2 of Cotonou almost secured can be a first step.
>
> Thanks
> Nicolas
>
>
>
>
> (1) :
> http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2016/apr/25/could-mapping-tech-revolutionise-disaster-response?CMP=share_btn_tw
>
> On Tue, Apr 26, 2016 at 1:52 AM, john whelan <jwhelan0112 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> >John, Ulule does not charge 40%, the fees reasonably amount to 7 or 8%,
>> that's a notable difference.
>>
>> If I donate $100 to a charity the net cost to me is $60 and $100 is more
>> or less available at the end.  If I donate $60 to the crowdsourcing then
>> $55 arrives at the end.  So if we can get creative with a charity the money
>> goes further.  Different western countries have different rules but
>> basically if it can be channeled through a charity more cash ends up on the
>> ground.
>>
>> West Africa, WHO are vacinating against polio is either there or not far
>> away, they need maps where do people live.  MSF have HOT projects around
>> that area.  Have a dig in HOT and you'll see sponsored projects around.
>> All the HOT projects suffer from having not that many people on the ground
>> for street names etc.  The charities have purchased image data before but
>> also DG and Mapbox have been very helpful to them.  If you're serious
>> about wanting to improve the state of the map in Bénin then working with
>> a charity might help both sides.
>>
>> I note there is HOT mapping in Togo which is close by at the moment
>> "Bâtiments, routes, chemins, zones résidentielles" which I assume is the
>> sort of thing you're after.  Have a chat to the organizers of that project
>> and see which charities are involved if any.  There are four projects in
>> Bénin at the moment.
>>
>> Currently for Cotonou there is some Mapbox imagery not the greatest but
>> I think you could squeeze a few more highways etc out of it.
>>
>> The HOT mailing list is probably the place to start and to be honest I
>> thunk that is where the discussion should be taking place, but currently
>> they're distracted by a couple of earthquakes.  I think the most effective
>> mapping comes out of a mixture of local knowledge and armchair mapping
>> where the map is blank.  Some of the charities are very well organised MSF
>> for example have developed expertise in the optimum size of HOT project and
>> complexity.  They also have tame validators and that seems to be key to
>> getting a HOT project completed in a reasonable time frame.
>> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM_Tasking_Manager/Validating_data
>> is worth reading through.
>>
>> The Treasury Board Canada might seem an unlikely source of assistance but
>> they have been instrumental in creating a open data license that is
>> acceptable to OSM and are working with at least one African country to use
>> the same license.  I think Jo has been importing a large number of schools
>> complete with names in one African country, it took a considerable amount
>> of time to get the license sorted out.  I understand if you have enough
>> mappers on the ground everything can get mapped but for quickness sometimes
>> a few high quality imports that are carefully imported can have benefits.
>>
>> So if you can raise the cash fine but if you can get the imagery in other
>> ways perhaps a few GPS units or a few smart phones for collecting POI data
>> might be an acceptable way of spending the cash raised.  If your crowd
>> funding doesn't quite raise enough cash then sometimes there are other ways
>> to get the imagery.
>>
>> Cheerio John
>>
>>
>>
>> On 25 April 2016 at 18:26, nicolas chavent <nicolas.chavent at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi there,
>>>
>>> Wow! None of the folks from the Association OSM Bénin nor those from the
>>> collective ProjetEOF who worked with the Benin mappers on this crowdfunding
>>> for imagery on 275km2 of Cotonou would have expected that email traffic.
>>>
>>> Great to see this talk on the talk list!
>>> Great also to read that this talk may develop into future new creative
>>> ways for Digital Globe and Map Box Satellite to assist OSM in Benin (many
>>> places outside of Cotonou which is likely to be handled through this
>>> crowdfunding) and in Western Africa (many places also) not to mention other
>>> places of this earth. I am not sure Christoph, if Kevin and Mikel will meet
>>> your criteria of 100% opendata imagery, surely this would be creative and
>>> awesome.
>>>
>>> A couple of points from my side, prior the mappers from Benin will talk
>>> and share their perspectives on this topic and the reasons that lead them
>>> to crowdfund for Cotonou and to bring this project to its end.
>>>
>>> At reading this thread in my late evening, comes first the surprise,
>>> that Simon puts up nicely, I am re-using his very words:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *I'm slightly taken back by the number of people wanting to jump in and
>>> make decisions for a local community on a topic that has little bearing
>>> outside of their region. Surely is must be their prerogative to decide how
>>> best to get imagery for their area, if at all (I do suspect that they will
>>> welcome alternative offers, but that is obviously up to them). Further I
>>> don't quite follow Christoph's argument. There is very very little imagery
>>> used in OSM that is available on open (data) terms. As long as the results
>>> of tracing etc  are essentially unencumbered nobody seems to have had
>>> issues with using non-free sources starting off with yahoo in 2007 and yes
>>> we've paid with money and in other ways for imagery in many places.*
>>>
>>> Frederik, field work is highly valued and practised in Benin and Western
>>> Africa as reflected in mappers stats, lists, wiki, social media (Twitter
>>> and Facebook) of mappers and local groups. The Benin guys as emailed have
>>> been actively mapping via field survey and remote mapping in Benin and
>>> Western Africa over the past 3 years. They have been active also in Cotonou
>>> through this time, with their own means, voluntarily in a poor country.
>>> They figured out that this situation had to change in Cotonou and got
>>> organized. One thing, you can be positive about, is that access to high res
>>> imagery over Cotonou will not kill their appetite for field work.
>>>
>>> Christoph you are right. Yes, it would have been better to acquire an
>>> imagery that could be fully distributed in opendata and not for tracing in
>>> OSM only the way this work for Bing, MapBox, specific humanitarian contexts
>>> (some Charter activations, the Imagery To The Crowd/ Map Give program of
>>> the US State Department) but this was out of reach. Shall the Benin folks
>>> have to keep surveying voluntarily the economic capital of their country
>>> instead of making the current compromise which has many precedents in OSM?
>>> Although the imagery is not fully served and distributed in opendata,
>>> through the generating of OSM data over Cotonou, it will mark a
>>> breakthrough for the local opendata movement by making the OSM base map of
>>> the city available to all. Like in many other places, this eventually will
>>> foster over time via a critical mass approach, the opening of geographical
>>> information. This is in that sense that opendata is meant in the email,
>>> blog post and project description in Ulule. Last, I agree with your idea
>>> (seeking full opendata imagery) but think that in making it happening one
>>> shall differentiate territories and contexts and that Cotonou, Benin is not
>>> ideal.
>>>
>>> John, Ulule does not charge 40%, the fees reasonably amount to 7 or 8%,
>>> that's a notable difference.
>>>
>>> John, Kevin and Mikel. Without commenting any further Simon first
>>> paragraph. Technically, what you are proposing (*using the crowdfunding
>>> money for other purposes*) may not even be possible or at least is not
>>> a good practise (not to say more). This may result into back clashes and
>>> distrust with the over 56 people who funded this project (*the purchase
>>> of high resolution imagery over Cotonou for OSM Benin*) or a bad record
>>> with Ulule. This can be negative for OSM Benin folks in the future shall
>>> they decide to crowdfund again for a similar or a different need.
>>>
>>> Kevin and Mikel, the @OSMBenin twitter account indicates that
>>> - your offers to assist OSM Bénin on Cotonou with imagery on the behalf
>>> of Digital Globe and Mapbox have been well heard.
>>> - the imagery need over that part of Cotonou will be addressed via this
>>> crowdfunding.
>>> - OSM Benin is keen on submitting other Areas Of Interest (AOIs) in
>>> Benin and in Western African in coordination with other Western African
>>> local OSM groups, they indicate that they are working on a uMap with
>>> priority AOIs.
>>> This could be a creative and positive development of this crowdfunding.
>>>
>>> Last, John which charities have you in minds to come to Benin and do the
>>> field work Kevin alluded to for the amount OSM Benin proposed to raise E
>>> 2,2k and how do you see this relating to the work of those mappers from
>>> Benin ?
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> Nicolas
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, Apr 25, 2016 at 10:47 PM, Martin Koppenhoefer <
>>> dieterdreist at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> sent from a phone
>>>>
>>>> > Il giorno 25 apr 2016, alle ore 20:41, Christoph Hormann <
>>>> chris_hormann at gmx.de> ha scritto:
>>>> >
>>>> > what is most readily available and most convenient for them and there
>>>> > is little incentive in providing alternatives just because they are
>>>> > open if they don't provide significant advantages for practical use.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> regarding Bing aerial imagery, other imagery will likely be better
>>>> referenced, at least this is my experience around here, even if the
>>>> resolution of Bing might be higher.
>>>>
>>>> cheers,
>>>> Martin
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> talk mailing list
>>>> talk at openstreetmap.org
>>>> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Nicolas Chavent
>>> Projet OpenStreetMap (OSM)
>>> Projet Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT)
>>> Projet Espace OSM Francophone (EOF)
>>> Mobile (FRA): +33 (0)6 52 40 78 20
>>> Mobile (CIV): +225 78 12 76 99
>>> <nicolas.chavent at hotosm.org>
>>> Email: nicolas.chavent at gmail.com
>>> Skype: c_nicolas
>>> Twitter: nicolas_chavent
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> talk mailing list
>>> talk at openstreetmap.org
>>> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Nicolas Chavent
> Projet OpenStreetMap (OSM)
> Projet Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT)
> Projet Espace OSM Francophone (EOF)
> Mobile (FRA): +33 (0)6 52 40 78 20
> Mobile (CIV): +225 78 12 76 99
> <nicolas.chavent at hotosm.org>
> Email: nicolas.chavent at gmail.com
> Skype: c_nicolas
> Twitter: nicolas_chavent
>
> _______________________________________________
> talk mailing list
> talk at openstreetmap.org
> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
>
>
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