[wordup] How the public lost their nautical charts...

[Adam Shand]

I'm not sure how much sense this will make without the thread context so 
I'll try and fill in the background.  Many of the community wireless 
groups (Personal Telco is the one I'm involved with) are trying to get 
access to street and topographic mapping data to maintain coverage maps 
of where their network covers and places that people can find access 
points (eg. http://maps.personaltelco.net/).

All of the commercial sources of this data either don't have public 
API's to access their map data or don't allow you to post images to 
another site then their own.  The one exception to this was MapBlast! 
which had both a public API and allowed reposting of a certain number of 
maps.  That was until recently when their public API and terms and 
conditions both changed unannounced (at least that we new of).  Shortly 
after that it was announced that Microsoft had purchased them and we got 
  threating letters from their lawyers.

Anyway as we were investigating alternative sources of mapping data, 
including generating our own with teams of GPS clad wireless geeks this 
conversation came up.  In the US the Census Bureau has typically 
provided coarse mapping data to the public either for free online or for 
the cost of media if you want it on CD.  Over the last years this public 
information has slowly been given to commercial entities to develop and 
own.  The justification I believe is that it saves the government money 
because a company is now maintaining the data and presumably the 
government maintains some deal to get access to it for their needs.

The tragedy here is that a huge chuck of information which tax dollars 
paid for and was in the public domain has been being removed.

Below is more information.  As a disclaimer I've been acting as a middle 
man and most of the information above is my take on information I've 
learned from other people.  I believe that everything above us true but 
it's possible there are factual errors.  You can read the actual threads 
here:

   http://lists.spack.org/pipermail/mapdev/2002q4/000305.html
   http://lists.spack.org/pipermail/mapdev/2002q4/000314.html

Adam.

From: Braddock Gaskill <braddock at braddock.com>
Via: http://lists.personaltelco.net/mailman/listinfo/mapdev

I'm sorry this is a big off topic, but it's an important trend that
definitely impacts anyone who ever wants to map anything, and several
people have asked me for more info on the NOAA Nautical Chart
give-away.  Everyone should write their reps about this sort of thing,
and maybe file a FOIA to challenge it.  A _LOT_ of other government
agencies controlling a lot of public domain data seem to be flirting
with similar strategies...if their budget can't pay a contractor, they
consider paying the contractor in exclusive access to public data.

NOAA has a justification of their decision at:

   http://chartmaker.ncd.noaa.gov/ocs/rnc/nenc.htm

The highlight is quoted below:

"Under the agreement, Maptech was granted exclusive access to NOAA
digital chart data and certain technology such as a patented image
compression method and processes for updating raster charts. At their
own risk and expense, Maptech will make the official national suite of
RNCs and ENCs in collaboration with NOAA, and profit or lose by the
market success of their work. While this exclusivity has been
criticized, it is really much the same as any competitively awarded
contract where the winner has some exclusive right, e.g. to sell the
government a quantity of equipment or to perform a particular service,
and to profit by the result.

"In exchange for this exclusivity, NOAA specified some obligations and
safeguards. For example, Maptech is required to produce all charts
(not just the profitable ones); to meet NOAA standards; to issue new
editions every time NOAA does; to put in place an update service; to
make the results openly available to all at an affordable price; to
work towards the peak of distribution rather than the peak of
profitability; and to do this in perpetuity. NOAA also negotiated a
cap on the retail price of all products to protect the public, and set
performance measures for things like turnaround time. Additionally,
Maptech pays NOAA to support further R&D on electronic
charting. Maptech.s obligations are substantial and in no way can it
be said that they are getting the data for free."