Budgets

We have been navigating the red tape in our company to get some software tools we want to be effective. This quote from Milton Friedman kept coming to my mind.

There are four ways in which you can spend money. You can spend your own money on yourself. When you do that, why then you really watch out what you’re doing, and you try to get the most for your money. Then you can spend your own money on somebody else. For example, I buy a birthday present for someone. Well, then I’m not so careful about the content of the present, but I’m very careful about the cost. Then, I can spend somebody else’s money on myself. And if I spend somebody else’s money on myself, then I’m sure going to have a good lunch! Finally, I can spend somebody else’s money on somebody else. And if I spend somebody else’s money on somebody else, I’m not concerned about how much it is, and I’m not concerned about what I get.

Here is a video of Milton Friedman about this. Here is a chart of the quadrants he talks about.

We have been working in quadrant III. Trying to get our company to spend their money on tools we need. We had to convince them that they will get a timely return on their investment.

TomTom and Garmin fighting for Tele Atlas

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aBR6ofSbiCEM&refer=home

How soon till Google and Microsoft are rumored to be making a bid too? I'd bet there an article (not even just a blog) speculating that by Monday.

C'mon Google, seriously?

Mapperz Blog, a must read recently btw, reports on Google new to estimate traffic in their driving directions time estimate. Read the article here. How many layers of estimated data can be piled upon each other before people just start completely ignoring results? Let's see, we have the original street network geometry (1), the individual cells classifications (2), the speeds assigned to the classifications (3), the routing optimization methods (4), and now traffic volume estimates (6). If you roll a dice six times and add the total what do you get? Could be anything from 6 to 36. The answer is 21 then right? It halfway between the two possible extremes. What if I knew the first of the six dice was 5? Then the "answer" is 22.5 and somehow people think my guess is really good? I don't get it. Drivetime data sucks. Get over it people. Two people leaving the same spot at the same time don't even take the same amount of time to travel. You think some software can tell you what travel time will be?

Alright I'm done. I'm going to the beach to relax, apparently I need it...

Gizmodo article on Google's Camera Car fleet

Article here. Presumably they're for the Streetview functionality they added to Google Maps recently, but with Google, who knows what they're up to.

Timoney Group at it again.

I remember being impressed by the way they used Google Earth before. Well now they've impressed again. Check them out making BLM, Oil and Gas Wells, and Federal Lands info available as KML for the Rocky Mountain states here: http://www.rockiesog.com/

What's really impressive about this is the way they take advantage of new KML spec including the Regions functionality to stream out huge amounts of data, from huge databases, at a very good speed. That shows it's possible for datasets that used to be only practical as fusion built layers to be shared as streamed static kml instead.

A discussion of this point is at Ogle Earth.

Data Visualization Site

Many Eyes

Very cool site that visualizes data in many ways. Users can upload data and explore it in different ways. Someone posted what looks like a grocery store's sales by dept which was very interesting to view as sized bubbles (sorry no link, site broke as I went back to get the link -- hey, it's in beta still). What brought me to the site was a series of political earmark spending visualized. The interface was very adept at switching between per capita, total, by category, and whatever other types of visualizations I ignored.

Different Real Estate Web Site

Terabitz

It's very Web2.0. I like that it's a different approach to the same old task. There are things to consider here. Also, I like that it takes non-real estate info and will plot it along side it. And, btw, it's using Google's Maps API for the maps.

Ending my Vacation with Ice Cream

I found the nearest Cold Stone and discovered they have a nice Google Maps mashup. I like the tabs in the info bubble.

Yummy!!!!!!

Mmmmmm Google Maps Mashup

Mapping + Games

http://www.andybeaulieu.com/silverlight/DestroyAll/Default.html

Web game that uses VE's BirdsEye View imagery as the background.

iPhone and KML

I discovered that the maps feature of the iPhone will load a KML file that is on a webserver. It only shows the name and location (as the standard red push pin) but its nice to know it does something with it.

Also I tried to load a kml from maps.google.com via Safari, but it was smart enough to send me to change to the maps app.

Also it will show 2 Billion Points!

dragging on the map to change route

http://maps.google.com/help/maps/directions/ - watch the video. imagine jerrie and i doing one if you want some laughs.

Seriously, do I have to discover a new cool thing you can do with google maps EVERY DAY? Do they have like 400 people working on these projects? Sigh.

I mean, sure, it’s basically just a creative way of using multi-point routing to create custom routes, but they do so well. User doesn’t care how it’s done, they just want it to be easy to do what they want to do. Google gets the user friendly thing like nobody else. Bastards.

Picture legend and pictures at icon and within bubble.

http://picasaweb.google.com/picasateam/VegasWeekend/photo#map

Thanks Google. Thanks for doing something new that will now be required of the upcoming FastMap2. Great. Please, go ahead and add new functionality or ideas daily if you can. That would be great. Our team will stay right there with you. Maybe 2 things on Saturdays huh? How's that sound?

I'm going to the beach to scout hot dog stand locations...

Mapgroove and Zeemaps

Mapgroove and Zeemaps both came to my attention today and are both excellent examples of what can be done to make a user friendly interface for placing info on maps and creating multiple usable output types. Both use google maps for their map interface, though Zeemaps uses Mapquest for their pdf prints. I have a feeling we'll figure out the hard way why they made that choice.

Microsoft Bashing

Why bash Microsoft? I needed something easy to do this morning before diving into something difficult. To make it even easier on myself, I'll just post a link to someone else's bashing that I found entertaining and simply my additional comment of "yah, damn Microsoft" to it.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/margaret-heffernan-/why-does-microsoft-hate-i_b_52992.html

KML closer to an OGC standard

http://www.gcn.com/online/vol1_no1/44454-1.html

Slashgeo linked to the story above. Microsoft is said to be joining the OGC soon. It would be fun to see them using OGC standard KML. Can you imagine VE importing and exporting KML? :)

Polygon search on a real estate web site

http://www.johnlscott.com/default.aspx

A real estate site using a polygon search. Some good and bad to pick from on this interface, definitely worth looking at since we'll have to do a poly search interface soon too. Uses VE for the mapping engine.

Everyscape

http://everyscape.com/

Cool demo. I'll have to remind myself to come back and check this out when it launches.

Location Searching Patented?

http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2007/06/location_patent

How dumb is this? Maybe someone patented breathing once too. That would be worth something these days, lots of people are into breathing, especially air.

Self censorship didn't take long

The humorous/concerning pictures from Google's Street View, appear to be gone. Fell free to do embarrassing things in public you are safe from the "GoogleVan"

Picture no longer available

Ask.com new map tool

http://city.ask.com/city?msid=ee662330245ff8809dcdb4916751a9e3&msuserid=e13309fb950631dd919e5b43327a82ed#1

of the local search variety following the likes of google, microsoft, and yahoo. a few interesting differences and worth a brief look.