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| GeoCommunity Mailing List |
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| Mailing List Archives |
| Subject: | GISList: SDTS DEMs Situation Revisited... |
| Date: |
08/19/2001 07:51:20 PM |
| From: |
BBitters1 .. aol.com |
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Let's try and take a closer look at the implications of USGS' actions in
allowing commercial enterprises to host the new and revised SDTS DEM.
Everywhere, people are asking that higher resolution data be made available
for public use. As more and more applications are found for publicly
available data, it becomes more apparent that the resolution of the
accessible data is not fully adequate to provide definitive solutions. As a
consequence, higher resolution data and the resulting order-of-magnitude
increases in storage space occur. As an example, the future of DEM data will
serve as a fine illustration of this situation.
Shortly after the first of the year, USGS will start making the SRTM DEM data
available to the public. The SRTM data again updates the 30 meter US DEM.
(Hopefully, the data format will remain the same!) Also, the SRTM program
will include 100 meter DEM data for the entire world's landmass. The 30
meter data of the US and the 100 meter data of the world will require just
shy of a terabytes worth of storage space. This is a 100 fold increase in
just a single type of data
The EOS-DIS program is another example. Today this program is supposedly
generating in excess of a terabyte of data each day.
Without a really radical change in technology, serving these large volumes of
data on the Internet from the limited number of USGS/EOS-DIS webservers will
be an almost impossible task. For this reason, the decision to allow
interested commercial enterprises to serve USGS data on the Internet is
understandable.
However, these agreements should stipulate that accessibility to the data
should not be encumbered with needless commercial roadblocks. When these
roadblock are instituted with the sole intent of discouraging access to the
data in lieu of purchasing, this should be considered a breech of the
agreement to serve the data in a fair and open manner.
If this were in fact the case, then there would be no commercial enterprises
willing to serve-up USGS' data. Without the monetary incentive of potential
sales of the SDTS DEM data, the GeoComm folks would not have considered
serving the SDTS DEM. In the past, many organizations have repackaged USGS
data and marketed it for a profit.
In effect, this joint venture between USGS and GeoComm has effectively shut
out much of this data repackaging industry. By preventing the mass download
of the SDTS DEM data, it has become very difficult to obtain (free-of-charge
or at low cost) the new versions of the DEM data. Is this an attempt to
insure the purity of the data or an attempt at monopolizing the distribution
of the data?
Thanks for allowing me to ramble...
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Barry Bitters
Dept. Environ. Studies phone: (850) 936-1060
University of West Florida fax: (850) 936-1060
11000 University Parkway
Pensacola, Florida 32514 bbitters@uwf.edu
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