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belovedmonster
August 8th, 2008, 09:01 PM
Does anyone here contribute to www.openstreetmap.org ? It seems like a great project and I am thinking of picking up a GPS device and getting involved myself.

For those who don't know, it is basically a project to create a free, open source map of the entire world. If you already have a GPS device its really easy to contribute data just from your daily life without even going to much effort, but for more interested parties you can get involved with mapping specific areas and tagging that data and adding points of interest to the maps and such like. It's all very interesting.

iamBevan
August 8th, 2008, 11:16 PM
What an awesome idea :D

fatality_uk
August 9th, 2008, 02:22 AM
If I can get the GPS tracking data app to work on my HTC, I will be walking round Warsaw in a few weeks ;)

bobbocanfly
August 9th, 2008, 03:35 AM
Its a great idea, and I have cleaned up some of the lines near the reclaimed land near me which was really rough. Unfortunately I dont have a GPS, though if I did I would spend all my time mapping and geocaching, and have no time for Ubuntu work.

belovedmonster
August 9th, 2008, 01:48 PM
Unfortunately I dont have a GPS

They organise regular "Mapping parties" where you can turn up, meet loads of other hardcore mappers and borrow one of the Foundation's GPS device for the day. Seems like a good way to get involved from time to time without needing to own a device. There will probably be a party near you sometime soon if you live in a major city.

Northsider
August 9th, 2008, 08:49 PM
I work for a mapping company and I found that site a few months ago! Like wikipedia it has the potential to be the most up-to-date map product out there. Cool idea, but I don't know how practical it can be.

belovedmonster
August 9th, 2008, 10:24 PM
The problem at the moment is GPS is still something uncommon. Once every mobile phone comes with GPS 18 months from now there is no reason why the map cant have complete coverage. Especially as I think once the map reaches a certain point of completeness then commercial venders will invest in doing the last 10 or 15%, because it will be cheaper to do that than continue licensing from the traditional map companies in the long run.

VitaLiNux
August 9th, 2008, 11:02 PM
Kudos to openstreetmap.org, they'll really rock with their project!!

BlackLLama
August 9th, 2008, 11:57 PM
does it tell you were to score some durgs haha jk

smartboyathome
August 10th, 2008, 12:34 AM
Now what we need is for openstreetmap to tell you directions. :p

belovedmonster
August 10th, 2008, 12:43 AM
does it tell you were to score some durgs haha jk

Well this is the beauty of an open source map isnt it. You can set up a community to make a map of drug dealers if you like :lolflag:

henke54
October 7th, 2008, 10:37 AM
It seems to me that opentom and openstreetmap could work well together
in a couple of ways.
http://www.opentom.org/Main_Page

mihai.ile
September 15th, 2010, 03:40 PM
This thread is quite old, I know, but would like to see if any of you still contribute to this project.

I successfully added my village and many roads nearby, even updated highways entry/exits in the near. (The map now is more updated than google maps which does not even have the new highway 1 year after completion)

I use just a simple HTC Hero with osm tracker for android for the gpx files and found a 5€ app (navdroyd) that uses the map to do offline routing like tomtom (but still has to improve to get there)

The map starts to get shape, how it is near your area?

newbie2
October 19th, 2010, 12:39 AM
OSM is even on Wallstreet Journal :

OSM, which started in 2004, and is exclusively run by volunteers, provides a geospatial database of mapping data online, which any individual, company or group can use for free to make their own maps or run their own map servers. In return OSM asks for attribution and for additions or improvements to the maps to be freely available. This year OSM counted 300,000 registered map makers, up from 1000 last year.

"Commercial companies can't compete with that sort of growth" said Hoff, adding, "businesses are starting to see the value in our community and take our volunteers very seriously. They are beginning to realize that to make the best maps, you need hundreds of people walking around on the ground observing what they see and deciding what they think is interesting, rather than cars driving around taking pictures. OSM lets people decide what's on a map."

The big tech giants are taking notice. When AOL's Mapquest announced it was adding OSM to its U.K. map offerings in July, it also announced a $1 million fund to support the growth of open source mapping in the United States. In August, Microsoft's BING search engine adopted OSM in its search engine platform.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20101018-708478.html
:popcorn:

mihai.ile
October 31st, 2010, 10:28 AM
nice article, hope that microsoft does not decide to make their version of improvements to osm with incompatible tags or something, like they made with the web through ie. Strange that MS is interested in the project, but it is welcomed! :D And now back to my edits and trying to add some more streets :)

sanderd17
November 29th, 2010, 09:59 PM
I'm a contributer of OSM, my village is pretty well maped. At least as far as I can. Since I don't have areal imagery, I can't map buildings or other landuses very good. I think this will become better after the donation of the bing areal imagery. I still wonder why ms would donate that.