Hi everybody
HOT is in a better and better place when it comes to imagery. There are more
options than ever. We have State HIU Imagery to the Crowd, MapBox Satellite,
Bing of course, as well as ways to request directly from imagery companies like
Astrium. And that's driven by the amazing work we all do, turning that imagery
into OpenStreetMap with breathtaking speed and quality, to serve humanitarian
response.
But honestly, we've struggled a bit to coordinate these beautiful resources.
Imagery requests have lots of detailed questions that need answering, and it's
important to know who is working of serving those requests. There's a real need
to understand the capabilities and motivations of all involved. As well, a need
to properly recognize the contribution imagery makes to our responses.
This topic has been discussed a few times over the past months, among the
coordinators of recent activations, here on the hot@ list, on the requirements
and options for coordination tools
(https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/hot/2014-April/004980.html), and
last week among a group of organizations involved in fulfilling imagery
requests. These have been really useful, to get a full picture of the imagery
situation, and common needs have boiled down to the following:
* Set up a simple imagery coordination request tool, styled as public calls for
imagery to be fulfilled. There are a couple options, including this tool from
State HIU https://github.com/state-hiu/image_request. Drazen and the Tech WG
are looking into it.
* Maintain a consistent backchannel, for lightweight coordination around public
calls for imagery. Discussion with providers before requests are fulfilled need
privacy, before they results can be shared publicly
* HOT should maintain a consistent liaison for questions on imagery requests.
How this works is probably a good question for the Activation WG to take up.
Appreciate everyone who's making contributions towards a solid method here, and
look forward to talking more about it in the various working groups.
Best
Mikel
* Mikel Maron * +14152835207 @mikel s:mikelmaron
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