Open Street Map
OpenStreetMap (OSM) is a collaborative project to create a free editable map of the world. Two major driving forces behind the establishment and growth of OSM have been restrictions on use or availability of map information across much of the world and the advent of inexpensive portable satellite navigation devices.
Founded by Steve Coast in 2004, it was inspired by the success of Wikipedia and preponderance of proprietary map data in the UK and elsewhere. Since then, it has grown to over 900,000 contributors, who collect data with GPS devices, aerial photography, and other free sources. This crowdsourced data is then made available under the Open Database License. The site is supported by the OpenStreetMap Foundation, a non-profit organization registered in England.
Rather than the map itself, the data generated by the OpenStreetMap project is considered its primary output. This data is then available for use in both traditional applications, like its usage by Craigslist and Foursquare to replace Google Maps, and more unusual roles, like replacing default data included with GPS receivers. This data has been favorably compared with proprietary datasources, though data quality varies worldwide.
Read more about Open Street Map: History, Contributors, Licensing, Using OpenStreetMap, Data Format
Famous quotes containing the words open, street and/or map:
“I not deny
The jury, passing on the prisoner’s life,
May in the sworn twelve have a thief or two
Guiltier than him they try. What’s open made to justice,
That justice seizes.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“[I]t forged ahead to become a full-fledged metropolis, with 143 faro games, 30 saloons, 4 banks, 27 produce stores, 3 express offices—and an arena for bull-and-bear fights, which, described by Horace Greeley in the New York Tribune, is said to have given Wall Street its best-known phrases.”
—For the State of California, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“When I had mapped the pond ... I laid a rule on the map lengthwise, and then breadthwise, and found, to my surprise, that the line of greatest length intersected the line of greatest breadth exactly at the point of greatest depth.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)