http://gecensus.blogspot.com/The GANIS Blog (
http://ganis.spno.ca/?p=31) includes an entry about
gcensus, where US census data are mashed up onto google maps. It is a
similar idea to the poly9 Quebec Politics map that appeared on the list.
I luv how google maps has brought geography and maps to citizens, that
citizens can bypass the purchase of inaccessible expensive data and do
not need to buy proprietary GIS software to manipulate data. It is
democratizing cartography and bringing the spatial to the fore.
Concurrently this approach is not good cartography, the data are not
represented accurately, there is a lack of documentation, the legends
are minimal, and there are few if any metadata to help build trust in
the representation and the data sources.
I have been thinking alot about methodology regarding data
representations. In my mind, irrespective of who creates the
information artifact, data quality and trust are a prerequisite and some
sort of information that can attest to that fact are required. Bad
decisions are made with poor or inaccurate representations. So i wonder
if other on the list have been thinking about this. In other words how
do know you can trust what is being represented?
Just thinking out loud!
Tracey
Locked
