Microsoft and partners recently announced additional details of Eye on Earth, a public / private partnership and data sharing initiative, designed to encourage and support data sharing from diverse sources interested in managing and preserving the Earth’s resources. Supported by various social sharing resources (facebook, twitter, youtube and a forum) , several preview web services are currently online to share information on water resources, noise, air, and marine bio diversity. Key industry partners include Microsoft, Esri, and the European Environmental Agency – the mapping platform used is ArcGIS Online. See http://www.eyeonearth.org.
More about Eye on Earth – The Eye on Earth network provides organisations with a security-enhanced central location for managing their geospatial environmental content. It uses Esri’s ArcGIS Online cloud services coupled with Windows Azure and Microsoft SQL Azure, and it hosts the data in the Environmental Data Store. The network’s user interface enables the easy creation and sharing of map-based services, translating complex scientific data into accessible, interactive and visual web services
For more info see – Eye on Earth Enables Cloud-Based Environmental Data Sharing