External Innovation and the Diffusion of Geospatial Capability Across Technology Verticals, 2011–2026

Abstract From 2011 to 2026, organizations outside the traditional geospatial industry became major developers of geographic data and technology. Ride-hailing firms built spatial indexes to price and dispatch trips. Social networks and cloud providers generated building and road data with machine learning and released it openly. Automakers bought a map company to keep it out … Continue reading External Innovation and the Diffusion of Geospatial Capability Across Technology Verticals, 2011–2026 →

The Indispensable Backwater

I've spent all of my professional life working in geospatial technology. During that time, I've watched the industry move from specialized workstations and expensive proprietary software to web services, the cloud, and open-source software. I've also watched geospatial capabilities become embedded in nearly every corner of the modern economy. Yet, despite all of that, geospatial … Continue reading The Indispensable Backwater →

Narrative Maps in WordPress

If you're reading this blog, you probably know I use self-hosted WordPress and have for many years. I have used the narrative cartography ("story map") format quite a bit recently, and my go-to has been this open-source project: https://github.com/opengeos/maplibre-gl-storymapsIt has been both elegant and easy to use and I highly recommend it. My only frustration … Continue reading Narrative Maps in WordPress →

The “R” Word

My retirement plan is pretty simple. I don’t plan to. I am fortunate to enjoy my work and see no reason to stop doing it in response to an arbitrary age boundary. Geography figures into that viewpoint. I grew up in the DC area, where the news was always dominated by local and national leaders … Continue reading The “R” Word →

Revisiting Open Data and AI

In my recent work, including withe Clairvoyint, I've been using Overspan lately to access OpenStreetMap data with AI. It operates a full-planet Overpass service with an MCP interface, which gives me a convenient way to work with OSM without maintaining that infrastructure myself. Its paid plans put explicit limits around requests and query resources. That … Continue reading Revisiting Open Data and AI →