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Visualizations and mashups in online news production
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Visualizations and mashups in online news production
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Content
VISUALIZATIONS AND MASHUPS
IN ONLINE NEWS PRODUCTION
by
Andy Sternberg
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(ONLINE JOURNALISM)
May 2007
Copyright 2007 Andy Sternberg
ii
Table of Contents
Abstract iii
Chapter 1: History 1
Chapter 2: Two Models 4
Chapter 3: GIS Technology — An Explanation 6
Chapter 4: Use of GIS-based Maps in the News 8
Chapter 5: Interactivity, Google Maps, and Mashups 11
Chapter 6: Google Earth, Geotagging, 3-D and Movement 13
Chapter 7: Privacy and Accessibility 15
Chapter 8: Emerging Concepts in Interactive Online Maps 18
Chapter 9: GIS, Maps, and Interactivity in the Future 21
Chapter 10: Conclusion 23
Bibliography 26
Appendices
Appendix A — Visual References 30
Appendix B — Tools for Journalists 50
iii
Abstract
Many digital technologies are emerging as production and consumption of
news shift to online media. With the growth of citizen journalism and the increased
availability and access to information, data, and analytical tools, online news has the
potential to become an effective tool in restoring public trust in media. This paper
examines the most promising of these developing technologies.
1
1. History
The physical geography of Earth and its geospatial idiosyncrasies have been
debated since long before Columbus set sail to the West and thought he landed in
India. Two millennia prior, Aristotle had already proven the spherical shape of the
planet to the utter disbelief of society for centuries to come.
1
While a cartographic
revolution of sorts took place in the mathematical and theoretical improvements in
maps of the 15
th
and 16
th
centuries, debates over the physical geography of Earth
would continue until the emergence of computer and satellite technology, alongside
space travel in the 20
th
century.
Soon after the launch of the Soviet spacecraft Sputnik in 1957 first enabled
photography from Earth’s orbit, the development of Geographical
Information Systems (GIS) technology began. The evolution of GIS in practice is not
clear, according to historians, but British geographer Roger Tomlinson is generally
credited with creating the specialized field by beginning development of the
Canadian Geographic Information System (CGIS) in 1963
2
. Six years later, Jack and
Laura Dangermond founded the Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI),
which since 1981 has produced the industry standard ArcGIS software (initially
ARC/INFO)
3
.
NASA’s Apollo Program
4
produced many historic moments in U.S. history
including Neil Armstrong’s famous broadcast while “walking” on the moon.
1
“Aristotle.” (2006). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved August 8, 2006, from Encyclopædia
Britannica Online: http://search.eb.com/eb/article-9108312
2
http://www.aag.org/tomlinson/
3
http://www.esri.com/company/about/history.html
4
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/apollo/
2
More significant in the revolution of technology and visualization is the vivid photo
of the full Earth, taken during the 1969 Apollo 10 mission. This fascinating image
burned a new, concrete, and emotional connection to the Earth witnessed from a
distance — an isolated and fragile body. Later that year, John McConnell imprinted
the image on flags and copyrighted the “Earth Flag.”
5
Months later, the flag was a
centerpiece at the inaugural Earth Day and the environmental movement had
officially begun.
By the 1970s more advanced satellites such as LandSat were put into orbit
for mapping purposes and for surveillance in defense of the Cold War. These
satellites, funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, redefined the field of
geography and how maps are made. It is also one reason that satellite-based 3-D
images face many obstacles before being embraced by the public. Considering the
original sources of the technology, many societies have equated imaging satellites as
instruments used for surveillance.
After the invention of the World Wide Web in 1989
6
, in which the Internet
became part of the public trust, users grew to demand and expect access to data that
had previously only been available to government institutions, such as the U.S.
Defense Department.
5
McConnell, John. "The History of the Earth Flag," originally printed in The Flag Bulletin
March/April 1982. Accessed March 10, 2007 via http://members.aol.com/TrusteeOne/essay27.html
6
Berners-Lee, Tim. “Longer Bio” accessed March 3, 2007 via http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-
Lee/Longer.html
3
Software and applications could now be distributed via the Internet, and in part
because the nature of the World Wide Web as envisioned by Tim Berners-Lee was
an open, noncommercial resource for all, a large percentage of these programs were
open-source — available at no cost and complete with the code structure for anyone to
manipulate or improve upon.
As the source and uses of space technologies have been taken over by media
corporations and open-source enthusiasts, satellite imagery is increasingly seen as a
public commodity. GIS visualization is increasingly seen as a trustworthy and benign
source of visual information . However, for privacy and national security interests,
the extent to which satellite imagery is available is determined by the federal
government. In the United States it is the National Center for Geospatial Intelligence
Standards (NCGIS) is the coordinating organization within the National Geospatial-
Intelligence Agency (NGA)
7
and the National Mapping Program
8
. In the UK and
European Union, open access movments such as OpenGeoData
9
continue to push
for the availability of these files for free.
7
http://www.nga.mil/portal/site/nga01/?epi_menuItemID=178acf72d127b72edcc133449a27a759&epi_
menuID=2a4a41d1917b685cdcc133449a27a759&epi_baseMenuID=b7a9ba3525aee259dcc133449a2
7a759
8
http://nationalmap.gov/gio/standards/
9
http://okfn.org/wiki/OpenGeoData accessed March 25, 2007
4
2. Two Models
Current trends in map usage for online news production can be delineated by
two distinct models: the “cinematic” and the “interactive.” Visual maps as cinematic
devices for online storytelling and news reporting in the form of static graphics have
grown to encompass a range of preprogrammed models often presented with the help
of motion-enhanced multimedia programs such as Macromedia Flash. While
cinematic content can be highly advanced, including video, 3-D presentations, and
other complex technologies, it is essentially created and produced by a graphics
specialist. Most importantly, the cinematic model does not allow for in-depth
interactivity (beyond basic start/stop navigation), ensuring that the content is
delivered as a controlled and immutable production.
The “interactive” model has grown rapidly alongside the emergence of
widespread broadband Internet access, further enabled by a growing pool of user-
generated content and a wealth information, resources, and applications provided and
shared by a strong open-source community. In “interactive” models, an application,
often constructed by a graphics specialist, is developed for the interactive use,
interpretation, and enjoyment of the audience. The user is provided with the tools and
data or information with which to draw from and to open the possibilities for
creation and exploration. This becomes a participatory quest for information and
knowledge.
Both “interactive” and “cinematic” map presentations are valuable tools in
online news gathering, analysis, and reporting. But the implementation of
5
interactivity in online content signals the news media’s acknowledgment of a fast-
developing “hands-on” approach to the future of digital technology. The BBC and
other British media outlets have led the charge in adapting to and encouraging
increased user interactivity, online comments, and rich multimedia content
development on Internet news sites. The U.S. media is fast catching up, however.
CNN, for example, after exposing many viewers to the Keyhole satellite imagery
that would become integral to Google Earth, has since relied on citizen-generated
photos and video of the July 2005 London Underground bombings and the 2006
conflict in Lebanon and northern Israel. In August 2006, CNN launched
Exchange
10
, to showcase user-generated news footage and commentary. Yahoo!
followed suit in December, partnering with Reuters to form YouWitness News
11
,
and in February 2007 the Associated Press announced a partnership with the user-
generated news site NowPublic
12
. Furthermore, growing communities of Internet
users are encouraging the geocoding — the process of assigning geographic
identifiers such as latitude and longitude or ZIP codes
13
— to data, text, and media,
enable the aggregation and visualization of
to
localized online content.
10
http://www.cnn.com/exchange/
11
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/04/technology/04yahoo.html
12
http://www.ap.org/pages/about/pressreleases/pr_020907a.html
13
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocoding
6
3. GIS Technology — An Explanation
As computers became more advanced in the 1990s and could store more
digital information while processing data faster, the functionality of converting
spatial data into visual representation for public use became a reality. In 1988, the
National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis (NCGIA) was established
in the United States, the first GIS Conference was held, and the U.S. Census Bureau
for the first time released its TIGER (Topographically Integrated Geographic
Encoding and Referencing) digital data product.
The era of GAS in the newsroom had begun, and GIS has since redefined public
interest newspaper reporting as an extension of computer-assisted reporting (CAR).
As GIS provides the technology to extend database research and analysis into
the visual sphere, it has become the premier tool for journalists who practice CAR.
This technique encompasses “anything that uses computers to aid in the news-
gathering process” (Garrison, 3). Before the emergence of the modern-day Web
browser in 1995 (The Netscape Navigator 1.0 Beta was released in October 1994
14
),
CAR was primarily limited to database analysis using word processing spreadsheet
applications such as Microsoft Excel. The U.S. Census, for example, can be data-
sorted in different ways in an Excel spreadsheet. It can be downloaded and saved as
a database (DBF4) file, and imported into GIS software, such as ESRI’s ArcGIS. It is
then possible to examine U.S. Census information laid out visually on a map.
14
http://wp.netscape.com/newsref/pr/newsrelease1.html
7
The layering component in GIS software offers another dynamic to U.S. Census studies
by making it possible to create multiple layers of information on one map.
ArcGIS uses “shapefiles” (.shp) that contain a visual image and a data table.
Shapefiles are comprised of at least three required files: .shp (the visual image); .dbf
(the data table), and .shx (the index file). Other file types that are commonly
incorporated are: .prj (projection definition); .xml (meta data description); .iag
(geocoding index); and graphic info (Hutchinson, 6-7).
After building the basic layers of a map, by importing the TIGER
(Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing) files
15
constituting
the streets, counties, cities, and bodies of water for the state or region involved,
database (DBF4) files can be “joined” as additional layers. For example, it is
possible to add multiple databases to these files.
To illustrate the relative ease of use and flexibility of this software, let me
give a brief demonstration: If I were to write an article on the location of senior
community centers in Los Angeles County in relation to where citizens over the age
of 65 reside, I would first download census data from the U.S. Census Bureau
16
. I
would save the census tract for L.A. County population sorted by age and open it in
Microsoft Excel. I would then delete the columns containing men and women under
65 and then would add a column to compute the percentages of the remaining age
15
http://arcdata.esri.com/data/tiger2000/tiger_download.cfm
16
http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/DownloadDatasetServlet?_lang=en
8
groups. I could also download the same information as thematic map files.
17
I can
convert information available on Los Angeles County Senior Citizen Center Web
site
18
into a database (DBF4) file using Excel and import that into ArcGIS as well.
By setting four gradations (by percent of total), I can color code the L.A.
County municipalities based on concentration of seniors. I can identify the location
of the senior centers with large dots and the map would detail the story — senior
community centers tend to be located far from areas with concentrated populations
of seniors.
Additional geospatial data and information are available at the U.S. Geospatial
One-Stop.
19
4. Use of GIS-based Maps in the News
Flat, two-dimensional graphic maps have been integrated into television and
print news for decades. Since the growth of Internet-based news Web sites in the
1990s, the use of three-dimensional satellite images and enhanced interactive maps
has added value to many sites. But the cost of production and of GIS applications
had often been prohibitive; the technical knowledge and time necessary to produce
integrated maps required skilled professionals, time, and editors with the vision to
commit resources to them.
17
http://factfinder.census.gov/jsp/saff/SAFFInfo.jsp?_pageId=thematicmaps&_submenuId=maps_1&ge
o_id=01000US
18
http://phps.dhs.co.la.ca.us/docs/SeniorCitizenCenters_1.doc
19
http://gos2.geodata.gov/wps/portal/gos
9
With the rich dynamic capabilities of ArcGIS and other, more simplified GIS
applications, journalists can now produce provocative, eye-grabbing, and effective
exposés and informative pieces using public data made available by the U.S. Census
Bureau and other resources. While the hand of a graphics artist is always welcome in the
newsroom, much of this technology is now within the capabilities of a tech-savvy
reporter. The GIS graphics now become an important and relatively inexpensive
and rapid way for a news organization to enhance and complement text, whether on a
Web site or in print.
For example, the rich use of color gradation and 3-D elements in the San Jose
Mercury News’ 1998 coverage of housing development in landslide areas of Santa
Cruz County not only educated readers to the local topography and geography, but
also revealed years of controversial land use and development (Herzog, 79-90). The
Santa Cruz study, like others described in David Herzog’s 2003 book Mapping the
News, would have involved a newspaper’s CAR editor or otherwise IT-specialized
employee. But Herzog’s succession of examples of GIS projects in various
newsrooms makes it clear that GIS and satellite mapping are still in their infancy. In
each of Herzog’s examples, we discover that the researchers and reporters involved
usually learned more about GIS applications “on the fly” as they assembled their
news projects.
10
GIS is a very effective tool in enhancing political stories. In Mapping the
News, Herzog summarized the Washington Post’s excellent GIS work in the
aftermath of the 2000 election, which confirmed that the majority of discarded votes
in the decisive state of Florida were in districts containing higher populations of
blacks.
Following the 2004 election, Rolling Stone supplemented environmental
lawyer and Air America radio host Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s four-month investigation
into possible election fraud with a Web-only collection of additional resources and
GIS-enriched graphics
20
.
The New York Times created a Google map documenting three years of its
“36 Hours” columns. Clicking on a placemark in each American city leads to an
archived column detailing a weekend itinerary
21
. This seamless blend of image and
text was created by Faneuil Media
22
, founded by Rick Burnes, a New York Times
journalist who recently quit writing for the paper to focus on “fusing mapping and
data” technologies for online publication (Burnes). In February 2007, Faneuil Media
launched its own tool, Atlas, a Web application that enables Internet users at all
levels to create maps.
Other new open-source Web applications enable other companies to create
visualizations. Cartifact specializes in commercial real estate. Their primary clients
are Wall Street types who want detailed maps of commercial real estate and what’s
20
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/10463875/was_the_2004_election_stolen_sources_and_com
mentary
21
http://www.nytimes.com/gst/travel/36hours.html
22
http://faneuilmedia.com/
11
around them for spatial consistency, according to lead developer Eric Richardson.
Cartifact’s contributions to online journalism include a detailed map of Downtown
News Development Map
23
, and the Downtown LA Homeless map
24
, created using
open-source tools including VTBuilder
25
and Surfit
26
.
Although maps can be manipulated in many ways, they are theoretically
unbiased representations of geographic reality. Many GIS professionals anticipate
media interest and, for example, follow news feeds on floods around the world;
researchers then go out and scour for images to go with those stories
27
(Lauriault).
The data and images are then sold to the media to put into context.
The imagery can play an important role in molding public discourse. When
Thomas Friedman published the 2005 bestseller The World is Flat, Richard Florida
was quick to criticize Friedman’s analysis, using 3-D maps to demonstrate that while
globalization has changed the socioeconomic face of the world, it has hardly
“leveled” the playing field, as Friedman argued (Florida — see Appendix 1).
5. Interactivity, Google Maps, and Mashups
During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, CNN began using Keyhole, Inc.’s 3-D
satellite mapping technology along with Digital Globe’s image archive to provide
detailed graphics of locations in Iraq and wow viewers with the sensation that they
were flying over and into, for example, Baghdad’s Green Zone.
23
http://cartifact.com/dtnews/
24
http://homeless.cartifact.com/
25
http://www.vterrain.org/Doc/VTBuilder/overview.html
26
http://surfit.sourceforge.net/
27
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods/archiveatlas/index.htm
12
Use of Keyhole’s software was costly, yet the company gained a following from the
exposure it received from the “provided by keyhole.com” attribution stamped on
each TV or Internet graphic. In 2005, when Google purchased Keyhole and
incorporated its satellite database into Google Maps, a phenomenon was born and
satellite mapping technologies, once referred to simply as GIS, became user-friendly
and affordable and took on a new, popularizing role for an eager and growing
audience.
Since the 2005 public rollout of Google Maps and then Google Earth desktop
geo-viewer, or virtual globe
28
, dramatic changes have occurred in GIS. It is now as
easy to create a custom map online as it is to open an online bank account. This is
due to a confluence of developments, such as the rapid mass-marketization of
Google’s brand and the adoption of similar technologies by Microsoft and Yahoo!.
This occurred in concert with prolific innovation by hobbyists and news
professionals utilizing Application Programming Interfaces (API). An API is the
interface that a computer, data library, or application provides in order to enable the
sharing or exchange of data with other computer programs
29
. This, in turn, has fit
well with the open-source spirit of sharing in the Internet community.
The “mashup” — a term originally used to describe the phenomenon in
popular music of combining aspects of two different songs to create a dance floor hit —
is a Web-based combination of data or content from different sources to create a
new service or application. (The June 2006 Oxford English Dictionary defines it as:
28
SPACE definition: http://www.csiss.org/SPACE/resources/virtual-globes.php
29
TechWeb Encyclopedia: http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/defineterm.jhtml?term=api
13
“a mixture or fusion of disparate elements”).
30
The expanding pool of mashups — at first,
geocoded data and resources and applications to implement into Google Maps — and
more recently, Google Earth Network Links made available at the Google Earth
Community bulletin board
31
(geocoded enhancements, placemarks, and plug-ins,
generally marked with the extension .kml or .kmz), has led to the creation and
development of abundant mashup graphics, in print and online.
More recently, Internet developer Adrian Holovaty, who became an
overnight legend with his mashup of Chicago crime histories in a Google Map
32
and is now the director of editorial innovations for Washingtonpost.Newswe
Interactive, has generated comprehensive and highly sortable databases of
Congressional voting patterns
ek
33
.
6. Google Earth, Geotagging, 3-D and Movement
Of the 3-D mapping and virtual globe applications released in recent years,
Google Earth is the most advanced and most popular (as of June 2006, at least
30,000 developers use the Google API, and there have been over 100 million
downloads of the Google Earth desktop application, according to John Hanke,
Google Earth and Maps product director
34
). While the common user downloads for
the entertainment of being able to zoom in to bird's-eye satellite views of his or her house
and neighborhood from mere meters above, this often entices viewers to investigate
30
http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/entry/50291914
31
http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.php/Cat/0
32
http://chicagocrime.org
33
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/
34
http://news.com.com/Google+Earth+zooms+in/2100-1032_3-6082960.html
14
new perspectives. Many casual users become engaged with a technology that enables
different angles and views of -3D city- and landscapes and the ability to “fly around”
the virtual world. As the Internet thrives as an archive, it also offers many Google
Earth users an advantage by bookmarking — or placemarking — events, sites, and
photos with geospatial encoding for others to access and utilize on their computers.
In fact, over 1,000 customized datasets and applications have been spawned and
launched into the public domain, as aggregated by ProgrammableWeb.
35
More applications are launching that enable the simple geo-coding of data,
including text, images and video using the industry standard Geographic Mapping
Language (GML)
36
, often seen as “KML” or Keyhole Markup Language, referring to
the Keyhole, Inc. application that became Google Earth. This application is
interoperably readable by Google Earth, Microsoft Virtual Earth, Yahoo! Maps, and
other Web client mapping applications. GeoRSS
37
converts standard location
coordinates into code for maps in the news, and this code is archived at Web sites such as
MetaCarta
38
. MetaCarta’s geo-text search and geotagging products have led to
projects including GutenKarte, which analyze words in books made available by
Project Gutenberg to map out the places in a story -- for example, Tolstoy’s War and Peace
39
.
35
http://programmableweb.com/tag/mapping
36
http://www.opengeospatial.org/groups/?iid=31
37
http://www.georss.org/
38
http://metacarta.com/
39
http://gutenkarte.org/map/2600
15
Immersive animation and 3-D rendering are becoming increasingly popular
online. While massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs) often encourage not
only 3-D character interaction and manipulation, but movement as well, Second
Life
40
is one open-ended, 3-D virtual world that has become both its own global
micro-economy and an online conglomerate of islands between which users can
“fly.” The BBC purchased an island in Second Life in Ma, 2006
41
, to offer
hundreds of people the opportunity to experience a virtual simulcast of the One Big
Weekend event (see screenshots
42
). Also in May 2006, the USC Center on Public
Diplomacy hosted hundreds on a multimedia-rich island in Second Life for its Public
Diplomacy in Virtual Worlds
43
Awards presentation (see screenshots
44
). Online
photo storage sites Zoomr
45
and Flickr
46
encourage users to geotag photos, and
several applications are available to “fly over” photos based on their geocoded
information in Google Earth.
7. Privacy and Accessibility
As GIS becomes a mainstream tool of news publications, including broadcast
and online news sites, and by extension, their mass audiences, considerable issues of
efficiency, accuracy, and accessibility arise — as well as privacy and ethics regarding
visual integrity.
40
http://secondlife.com/
41
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4766755.stm
42
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52327305@N00/sets/72057594143177844/
43
http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/projects/mmog
44
http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/events/events_detail/1686/#skip
45
http://beta.zooomr.com/home
46
http://flickr.com/
16
Not unlike humans, computers have their flaws, and since GIS began rapidly
expanding into the mainstream follow,ing the 2005 release of new, free virtual globe
applications such Google Earth, the sensitivity of information made available —
along with the ability of maps to “lie” — has become a growing concern.
For national security reasons, no government allows public use of real-time
high-definition satellite imagery. But even use of archived images, such as those now
available for free on Google Earth, spark controversy as they can expose secret
military installations, residences of public officials and arguably impinge upon the
right to privacy. The Cryptome Web site
47
is home to an archive of controversial and
banned documents and images. Since 1996, Cryptome has collected 35,000 files,
including The Eyeball Series
48
, a large index of detailed bird's-eye satellite maps and
images of international military installations, missile launch sites, and residences of
world leaders.
Cryptome welcomes documents for publication that are prohibited by governments
worldwide, in particular material on freedom of expression, privacy, cryptology, dual-use
technologies, national security, intelligence, and secret governance — open, secret and
classified documents — but not limited to those.
49
These detailed satellite maps reveal the private residences of, for example,
Sen. Hillary Clinton, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and President George W. Bush’s Crawford,
Texas, ranch property, as well as international sites of significance such as North
Korea’s July 2006 missile test launch site and Guantanamo Bay.
47
http://www.cryptome.org
48
http://www.eyeball-series.org/
49
http://cryptome.org. Retrieved August 8, 2006.
17
Governments worldwide have expressed concern about Google Earth
regarding privacy and national security issues. In the immediate aftermath of the
August 2005 landfall of Hurricane Katrina, a collaboration of scientists teamed with
Google to form Global Connection and pooled resources to provide near real-time
aerial and satellite images of New Orleans that could be incorporated into Google
Earth and Maps.
50
But that October, after a devastating earthquake struck Kashmir,
relief organizations were denied access to high-resolution satellite images in the
name of national security (Butler, 2005). In 2005, after Taiwan complained about
being referred to as a province of China in Google Earth, the Chinese media
responded with rumors of a possible boycott of Google’s China service
51
. Since
2004, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Working Group of the U.S.
Federal Data Graphic Committee has proposed and repeatedly revised guidelines for
the distribution and identification of geospatial data sets containing potentially
sensitive information (Lesk). The committee’s most recent “DHS Geospatial Data
Model,” published in May 2006, is over 400 pages in length.
52
While the U.S. government makes most geospatial information publicly
available, European national mapping agencies have historically prohibited or highly
regulated access and licensing of geodata.
53
50
http://earth.google.com/katrina.html
51
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2005/10/04/2003274363
52
http://www.fgdc.gov/participation/working-groups-subcommittees/hswg/subgroups/info-content-
sg/documents/DHS-GDM-v1.1.pdf
53
http://okfn.org/geo/manifesto.php
18
Where Americans have open access to a glut of government-provided
geospatial data and satellite imagery, GIS and information professionals in the
European Union are battling for public access and open-sourcing of such crucial
elements to the development and proliferation of the information infrastructure.
“The potential for open-source GIS is amazing,” according to Open Source
Geospatial Foundation Director Jo Walsh, “but there’s a gaping disparity in different
countries regarding geodata in the public domain” (Walsh).
To this end, Walsh and others have proposed a “Spatial Data Infrastructure” that
calls for open sharing of government-collected geodata in a “standard, common
format.”
54
8. Emerging Concepts in Interactive Online Maps
In recent years, newspapers have accounted for a loss of revenue from
classified advertising to online listing services such as craigslist.org, eBay, and
online Realtors. But it is becoming clear to some newspapers that the tools are in
place — provided they have the necessary data — for them to retain their position at the top of the
classified industry. Several newspaper Web sites have begun implementing Google-
maps technology into both their classified functions and elsewhere. But their initial
efforts have been largely tentative and flawed.
54
http://space.frot.org/docs/why_sdi.html
19
While special-edition, topic-specific interactive maps such as the New York Times’
(Appendix A) are the most successful and consistent, too many online news maps are one-off
Macromedia Flash productions in which the high-tech aesthetics outweigh the quality
and accuracy of the information presented (Lauriault).
Efforts by some news organizations show great promise. As dynamic HTML
has become standard and the speed of computer processors and broadband
connections allows for the quick downloading of information, many newspaper sites
are incorporating rollover content — which displays after the user-controlled
mouse’s arrow or cursor rolls over an area of content — into map placemarks, images,
and even text. In April 2006, The Washington Post launched an online version of its
free Express tabloid with a focus on classified ads and hyper-local search.
ReadExpress.com features a “MetroLinks” guide, encouraging the user to search for
hotels, events, news, and restaurants by clicking on a Metro stop and also highlights
blog postings from the area
55
.
Bowling Green’s Kentucky Daily News uses a “mashup” of Google Maps and
Yahoo!’s geo-coding to provide an enhanced, interactive map of yard sales, updated
every Thursday
56
. The Murfreesboro (Tenn.) Daily News Journal uses a search
engine powered by homefinder.com to allow its users to map out their search of area
homes for sale by location, price, and number of bathrooms.
57
55
http://readexpress.com/
56
http://www.bgdailynews.com/yardsale/
57
http://www.homefinder.com/dnj/index_map.jhtml
20
After selecting from a detailed list of available houses, users can even prioritize their
selections to produce customized directions.
Satellite imagery and interactive maps are redefining how the housing and
real estate market is perceived and presented. Zillow.com, launched in February
2006 and powered by Microsoft Virtual Earth mapping technology, offers a free
model enabling users to not only visually plot real estate of differing valuations on a
map, but also to conduct 3-D interactive tours of different properties.
58
The Beta site is
approaching its goal of enabling buyers, sellers, and owners to access free valuations
of nearly every property in the United States and offers color-coded “heat maps” of
neighborhood values in 17 cities. In response to popular interest and in the spirit of
open-source and “the long tail,” in late July 2006, Zillow promised to allow for the
broad incorporation of its data on other Web applications through the use of an Open
API.
59
Similar mapping technology, combined with location-based advertising, has a
promising future in the online news medium. As long as the data exists, it can be
mashed up in Google Maps, just as HousingMaps produces a visualization of listings
on Craigslist
60
.
With the help of the multitude of APIs and Web-based applications powered
by advanced Google Earth or Microsoft Virtual Earth technology, the GIS map of
L.A. County Senior Community Centers could be easily replicated without requiring
ArcGIS or other professional-grade GIS software.
58
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/266480_zillow13.html
59
http://www.zillowblog.com/zillow_blog/2006/07/zillows_open_ap.html
60
http://www.housingmaps.com/
21
An Excel or text file of community centers can be imported, or manually entered
and instantly geocoded using free programs such as Batch Geocode.
61
The saved
geocoded data can then be mapped, or plotted out and designed using free online
make-your-own mashup applications such as Platial
62
or Mapbuilder
63
.
9. GIS, Maps, and Interactivity in the Future
At this point in its development, GIS and mapping technology gets a mixed
reception from media analysts. Mike Liebhold, a senior researcher at the Institute for
the Future, sees the general public as lukewarm or still reluctant to embrace
interactive multimedia maps in online news.
“We are just on the cusp of development of some great new mapping tools that hold
great promise for geo news blogging and geo journalism” (Liebhold).
Investigation into GIS technology supports this view. However, considering
the today’s youth’s growing comfort with emerging technology, it is possible that
many of the finest educational tools in the future, for kindergartners through adults,
will be rendered with the help of GIS research. For example, imagine learning about
climate change using a three-dimensional globe with color-coded, historically
accurate data projected onto it. In the near future, elementary schools may have large
interactive globes, or even flat plasma maps that translate historical data and
geological evolution theories into visual representations.
61
http://www.batchgeocode.com/
62
http://www.housingmaps.com/
63
http://www.mapbuilder.net/
22
Plot the known existence of Homo sapiens 5,000 years ago on a map of the world
consistent with the geography of the era. Watch carbon content in the atmosphere
rise at the start of agriculture, the Industrial Revolution, and the growth of the economies
of China and India. Mash that up with historical temperature records. And so on,
unleashing the imagination of students to create their own images based on satellite
maps and possibly real-time data.
Most importantly, the technology gives students control of future scenarios.
Assume Antarctica ice melts in the future. Assume it doesn’t. What does the world look
like according to each scenario? What should it look like? Even watch the world’s
weather over the course of the past 30 days on a spinning globe, over the course of 60
seconds. Then, use the interactive model to manipulate world climate patterns and
see how they affect today’s weather or the weather 20 years from now.
I can attest to the breakthrough era of the early 1980s, when, as a young
student, the Tandy/RadioShack TRS-80 computers were left to rot and suddenly, the
brilliant map/geography-based game “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego,”
became the coolest game to play in the Apple IIe-filled computer lab. As kids and
young adults continue to spend more and more time on a variety of “connected”
media, as opposed to in front of the TV, the prospect for visual and interactive
reporting, teaching, and learning is blossoming.
Healthy competition between free virtual globes such as Google Earth and
complete GIS desktop applications such as ESRI (which retails for $1,400) is
accelerating the capabilities and accessibility of geospatial map production for news
23
as well as the possibilities in GIS research and education. The concept of a “digital
Earth” announced in 1998 by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore envisioned the
virtual use of “the Earth itself as an organizing metaphor for digital information.
64
”
Twenty-five years ago, the personal computer democratized computing, and 10 years ago the
Web browser liberated the Internet. “So systems like Google Earth will democratize
GIS,” suggests Michael Goodchild, GIS expert at the University of California,
Santa Barbara (Butler, 2006).
10. Conclusion
With the widespread penetration of broadband technology — and free
mainstream software such as the Adobe Flash player
65
— the public is not interested
in simply a graphical rendering of an Excel (or Google) spreadsheet on a map. The
public wants to see it in motion. Better yet, the audience wants to control its
possibilities. Furthermore, as broadband, high-speed Internet access grows
worldwide and broadband speeds multiply, the audience reach for interactive, highly
dynamic multimedia presentations will increase exponentially. No fewer than 42 percent
of Americans have high-speed Internet access at home and nearly 50 million
Americans have created their own content on the Internet, according to the 2006
Technology and Media Use Study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
66
64
http://www.digitalearth.gov/VP19980131.html
65
http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/
66
http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Broadband_trends2006.pdf
24
While the public has grown to trust the media and the government less and less,
news organizations can build links to their audiences by making it easier for anyone
to mash up their own GIS projects given the tools and information. Therefore, the
role of online journalists may be not so much to provide answers as to offer the news
audience the tools and direction to reach multiple conclusions.
The infusion of Global Positioning Systems (GPS) into many mobile phones and
automobile dashboards caters to an increasing dependence on automated real-time
maps. For some occupations, such as taxi drivers, these devices have become
essential to their work and at increasingly reasonable prices. New applications such
as Mapbuilder, OpenLayers, Atlas, and Platial make it simple for users of handheld
or portable devices to plug in data or upload databases and create an enhanced map
using available geospatial data and mapping applications and technology. In August
2006, Sony released a small GPS device that attaches to a digital camera and
records the exact geo-location of every photo, allowing the photos to be immediately
mapped upon uploading (Sony). Photo-sharing and storage Web sites, such as
Flickr and Zoomr, by tapping into the open source Yahoo! Maps developer kit
67
,
Google Maps’ API tools developer kits
68
, or using mashup Web sites such as
Mappr
69
, are influencing the popularity of photo-geotagging and visualization on a
Virtual Earth interface such as Google Earth.
67
http://developer.yahoo.com/maps/
68
http://www.google.com/apis/maps/
69
http://www.mappr.com/
25
While data is constantly amassing on the Internet, it’s not merely the value of
mapping visualization that increases, but for the online journalist and consumer,
what also increases is simply the access to knowledge, data, and the increasing simplicity with which
various data sets can be examined. “Satellite imagery is just another set of data like
campaign finance data or legislative data,” said Faneuil Media founder Rick Burnes,
insinuating that 3-D visualizations and interactive mapping imagery are only one
small part of a larger information revolution.
At the same time, journalists and media organizations in general have been
slow to pick up on new technologies, according to Adrian Holovaty, editor of
editorial innovations at the Washington Post. Essentially there may never be one
without the other. “…[T]here should be human edited account of what’s happening
in the world and then a more granular method of browsing the raw information — it
should be hand in hand,” says Holovaty.
“Technology is now making it easier to do this with searchable databases,
interactive maps, news games or exercises, vlogs, podcasts, photo galleries and easy
to use content management systems,” says Jan Schaffer, executive director of J-lab:
The Institute for Interactive Journalism at the University of Maryland (Schaffer).
As citizen journalism continues to advance considerably in terms of both mainstream
acceptance and production, especially with regard to multimedia content, the
increase in interactivity involving mapping is sure to follow.
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30
Appendix A — Visual References
Maps make up 43% of the 1,746 mashups indexed at
ProgrammableWeb.com
There are 404 APIs indexed at ProgrammableWeb but GoogleMaps API
is used in 50% of all mashups.
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
Boston.com Mashup Guide to Red Sox Spring Training in Fort Myers,
FL. By Faneuil Media.
45
Cartifact.com’s Downtown Los Angeles Homeless visualization. Heat
map of the homeless population based on data gathered biweekly.
46
47
48
49
50
Appendix B — Tools for Journalists
DATA
Libre Maps — Free Maps and GIS Data repository: http://libre.redjar.org/maps/
U.S. Census Bureau — Cartographic Boundary Files:
http://www.census.gov/geo/www/cob/bdy_files.html
Open Source GIS — Detailed collection of and guide to GIS resources:
http://opensourcegis.org/
Digital Globe Image Archive: http://www.digitalglobe.com/index.php
GCensus: http://gecensus.stanford.edu/gcensus/index.html
Geography Network: http://www.geographynetwork.com
GeoData — Geography data and embedded GIS software from government agency
records: http://geodata.gov
MapDex — Search Geographic Data: http://www.mapdex.org/search/
California Spatial Information Library (CASIL): http://gis.ca.gov/BrowseCatalog.epl
Southern California GIS-Local Government Users Group: http://www.socalgis.org
2004 Home Mortgage Discovery Act: http://www.ffiec.gov/hmda/hmdaproducts.htm
Public Use MicroSample Data:
http://www.census.gov/mp/www/Tempcat/PUMS.html
Google Gapminder: http://tools.google.com/gapminder/
Neighboroo: mashup tool for real estate, marketing and census visualizations -
http://neighboroo.com/
51
ESRI: Industry leader in desktop GIS, maker of ArcGIS
MapInfo: Second in Market
Caliper: Makes Maptitude — a low cost GIS
GRASS (Geographic Resources Analysis Support System): Free open-source GIS.
GEO-VIEWERS
Google Earth: http://earth.google.com
NASA WorldWind: http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/
SINTEF Virtual Globe: http://globe.sintef.no/
Virtual Globes Directory: http://www.virtualglobes.org/
MAP-BUILDING / MASHUP APPS
ShowMeWhere — Easily create Google Maps:
http://showmewhere.net/gmap/index.php
Platial.com — mashups made easy: http://www.platial.com/splash
Mapbuilder.net — custom maps made easy: http://mapbuilder.net
Atlas — by Faneuil Media: http://fmatlas.com/atlas2/jsp/atlas.jsp
OpenLayers: http://openlayers.org/
ManyEyes: Collaborative visualizations and mashups by IBM Labs:
http://services.alphaworks.ibm.com/manyeyes/app
GIS RESOURCES / DIRECTORIES
Directions Mag — The Worldwide Source for Geospatial Technology:
http://www.directionsmag.com/
52
Programmable Web — Mashup and API repository, database:
http://www.programmableweb.com/
The Map Room Open Source GIS Guide:
http://www.mcwetboy.net/maproom/2005/09/open_source_gis_guide.phtml
OgleEarth Links List — for conversion, geotracking, google earth:
http://www.ogleearth.com/links.html
FREEGIS.org — http://freegis.org
TOOLS / HACKS / HOW TO
Google Earth Hacks: http://www.googleearthhacks.com/
View Flickr Photos in Google Earth: http://kmlphotos.metaltoad.com/
Geocode data in large batches: http://batchgeocode.com
Geotagthings — for easy geotagging of data: http://www.geotagthings.com/beta
How to Geotag photos:
http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2005/07/how_to_gps_tag.html
MetaCarta — Text to geocode conversion: http://www.metacarta.com/
Virtual Terrain Project — “foster the creation of tools for easily constructing any part
of the real world in interactive, 3D digital form.” http://vterrain.org/
Abstract (if available)
Abstract
Many digital technologies are emerging as production and consumption of news shifts to online media. With the growth of citizen journalism and the increased availability and access to information, data, and analytical tools, online news has the potential to become an effective tool in restoring public trust in media. This paper examines the most promising of these developing technologies.
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Asset Metadata
Creator
Sternberg, Andrew
(author)
Core Title
Visualizations and mashups in online news production
School
Annenberg School for Communication
Degree
Master of Arts
Degree Program
Journalism (Online Journalism)
Publication Date
04/23/2007
Defense Date
04/02/2007
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
geodata,GIS,Google,Maps,mashup,OAI-PMH Harvest,online
Language
English
Advisor
Pryor, Lawrence (
committee chair
), Cray, Edward (
committee member
), Thomas, Douglas (
committee member
)
Creator Email
andysternberg@gmail.com
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-m449
Unique identifier
UC1486981
Identifier
etd-Sternberg-20070423 (filename),usctheses-m40 (legacy collection record id),usctheses-c127-483607 (legacy record id),usctheses-m449 (legacy record id)
Legacy Identifier
etd-Sternberg-20070423.pdf
Dmrecord
483607
Document Type
Thesis
Rights
Sternberg, Andrew
Type
texts
Source
University of Southern California
(contributing entity),
University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses
(collection)
Repository Name
Libraries, University of Southern California
Repository Location
Los Angeles, California
Repository Email
cisadmin@lib.usc.edu
Tags
geodata
GIS
Google
mashup
online