Mapping the World

According to Time, in an effort to be the center of the Google Earth world, the city of Nanaimo (British Columbia) has put just about of every bit of public data available in Google Earth Format. Pretty nifty way of presenting maps to the the general world. Although it has some limitations-- as someone in the Time article put it:

"For people who live out of town, it would be a great resource and tool," he added. "But, to be fair, if you've been living here your whole life like I have, you don't need to use Google Maps. You just use your brain."

Which brings up two interesting points:

1. Technology is irrelevant unless it is used.
2. If locals aren't the primary users of geo-data, who is the geo-data being generated for?  

Still the idea of being able to track where each fire truck is is interesting. I only wish they had implemented it for buses.