Interesting news from the Virtual Earth Blog… IDV Solutions is about to release an iPhone application dubbed “Visual Fusion Contribute.” Visual Fusion Contribute is an enterprise iPhone application that uses Virtual Earth to allow a user to contribute geo-tagged photos and notes back to SharePoint. The notes and photos can then be shared out into a Visual Fusion Server application – Visual Fusion is IDV’s product for creating geospatial mashups within SharePoint. Now this is a great idea!
Archives for February 26, 2009
The Dell Social innovation competition
Here’s details of an interesting competition from Dell, designed to recognize excellence in social innovations and recognizing ideas that are changing the World. I head about this from a colleague of mine who heads up the Manna Energy Foundation (See their fqacebook page)- an amazing non-profit doing some amazing things!
About the competition – Manna has submitted an application for the 2009 Dell Social Innovation Competition. This competition is designed to reward ingenious ideas to change the world, tackle social problems and help every human reach their fullest potential. Our water treatment project falls squarely within that criteria. One winner will be chosen and awarded $50,000 as seed funding to launch their venture.
You all are the judges! Dell has invited everyone online to comment and vote on the ideas submitted into the competition. You just need to create a username with your e-mail address to log in and get involved! In each round of the competition, vote on the projects you like the most (which hopefully is the Manna project – this will promote us up in the ranking). Your vote matters! Leave comments and suggestions on the ideas you find most intriguing and add your expertise. The competition final event is May 7. One team walks away with $50,000, but people all over the world will benefit from a few big dreams.
http://www.dellsocialinnovationcompetition.com and vote for “CARBON CREDITS FOR WATER TREATMENT” by Manna Energy limited.
High Accuracy GIS data collection made simple
Topcon Positioning Systems has rolled out a new, GIS high-accuracy data collection kit for the new Topcon GMS-2 Pro. The selling feature of this… The kit gives GMS-2 Pro users the flexibility to easily increase their accuracy from submeter to subfoot when needed. The kit can be ordered with a GMS-2 Pro and choice of software to create a complete GIS high accuracy system. The GMS-2 Pro kit includes:
— PG-A5 external antenna with GMS-2 Pro cable;
— GMS-2 Pro pole bracket; and
— 2 meter pole.
Obama Meter – A Dashboard of the Economy maps stimulus spending, job creation and more
Trust the gang at FortiusOne to come up with this very slick solution enabling users to visualize and map the effects of the Obama Stimulus spending in an effort to kick start the economy – enter The ObamaMeter – A News Dashboard on the Economy. A description from FortiusOne…
introducing the GeoCommons News Dashboard where we’re mapping breaking news stories. Our first feature, the ‘ObamaMeter,’ is keeping tabs on the US economy, the global economy and the stimulus through our visual dashboard. Read Sean’s intro blog post here.These maps showcase the soon to be released GeoCommons API which enables you to implement a GeoCommons dashboard within your organization.
Sean Gorman has provided more information over on their blog, describing the application. He notes how theuy fuse together some 15 variables providing a clearer picture of the story, giving readers a view of the economy, focused on employment, stimulus, foreclosures, and the economy. Users have access to the raw data via the Maker! application (enabling creating of your own mashups) and the data is also available for export as KML for viewing within Google earth.
See the following:

Spot Image filling in Gaps in Alaska DEMs
Spot Image has a cool solution to fill in Gaps in Alaska DEM products… The company is boasting details of a recent completion of thirteen Reference3D geocells over the Chugach National Forest region of Alaska. These geocells are notable, as they provide the first broad area, DTED-2 quality DEM coverage in Alaska. See details here