Research help wanted for #W3GConf – crowd sourcing a presentation

About 3 weeks to go to GeoCommunity and W3GConf.

I am starting to think about my pressy at W3GConf which is entitled “Just because you can put something on a map …” Here are the bullet points that formed my abstract:

A flood of open data combined with ever easier to use tools for mapping that data has the potential to unlock insights or create interactive pincushions.

Opening up data does not guarantee useful or even truthful visualisations. You can mislead or even lie with maps unless you have an understanding of the context of the data you are mapping.

Is there is a role for someone who “understands” the data, its context and has some basic skills in geostatistics, presentation and analysis (all that boring paleo stuff)?

Will the wisdom of the crowd prevent miscommunication or fuel popular misconceptions?

Does it matter?

Hopefully you get the drift without me spoiling it for anyone who was planning to attend.

I thought I would try and crowd source some of the content for this pressy (i.e. get you to help me out). We have all seen web things with pointless, stupid, meaningless or just plain misleading usage of maps – let me know which are your favourites and pet hates. If you could contrast your worst examples with something that you think really “works” and adds value, conveys insight that would be even better (then I would have little or no work to do but pulling together some slides and some witty observations)

All contributions will be gratefully acknowledged within the pressy unless you request your bit to be anonymous (which might be a good idea if the site is run by your employer or a client). Either post on the comments or send through the “Contact Me”.

Still need more suggestions for the GeoBuzzword Bingo as well