In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

Slashdot is running a story named Augmented Reality's Disruptive Potential. That Layar app has been mentioned here a few times since 2009. Augmented reality is here to stay in one form or another. 

Their summary: "A company called Layar, based in Amsterdam, is working on products that take augmented reality in a slightly different direction. They provide a platform that allows anyone to build an AR app. Consider these ideas: you can use your mobile phone's camera to view the world; your phone knows where you are and what you are looking at. The implications are profound. One of the most interesting apps that someone produced was a virtual tee-shirt shop. It was placed in the 20 most expensive shopping streets in the world, selling t-shirts. Stop and think about that for a minute. He built a virtual shop where a real one already existed. His shop was accessible via a mobile phone, while the real one was accessible through, well, being real. Real space and its virtual overlay are being used by different people. There will be lawyers."

Here's the recent geonews in batch mode. Yes, on a Saturday! I'll be away for the next three weeks and dare delay my family's departure to feed you with these.

From the open source front:

• Mentioned before, the open source map design tool TileMill reached version 0.4.1   
• Some recent improvements of QGIS: an extraction projection tool for QGIS, a new MapInfo to QGIS style converter and Shield Labels for QGIS
• Not the first time it happened, a briton got arrested during his OpenStreetMap mapping activities, yes, that was before the recent London riots
• O'Reilly offers an entry named Open source maps tell data journalism stories in Afghanistan
• Paul Ramsey of the PostGIS fame shares interesting arguments on the open source vs proprietary debacle
• Here's an entry on generating elevation maps from along-track stereo pairs using the open source Orfeo ToolBox
• We told you ourselves a few times, but here's how James Fee telling us Why You Can’t Afford to Miss FOSS4G 2011

From the Esri front:

• The File GeoDatabase API version 1.1 has been released, in includes a .NET wrapper and bug fixes
• James Fee mentions PgMap and QMap to connect to spatial databases with ArcGIS 10.1 without SDE

From the Google front:

• In their learning series, here's an entry on GIS with Google Earth and Google Maps
• Google shares an entry on famine crisis relief in the Horn of Africa
• Here's the 50th anniversary of the building of the Berlin Wall in Google Earth
• Google invites us to visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial with Google Maps

On the Microsoft front:

• Microsoft updated their Bing Maps Account Center with three main improvements: Direct Publishing of Data Sources, Map Navigation for Data Editing, and Enhanced POI Data Search
• Here's an entry named KinectFusion Provides Low-Cost and Accessible 3D Interior Mapping

In the miscellaneous category:

• The Spatial Law blog shares a long entry named Geolocation and Privacy: Are We Going the Right Way?: "However, many of bills are so broadly written that if they were to become law they could apply to a broad range of geospatial products and services, including satellite and aerial imagery, GIS and GPS."
• VerySpatial mentions the launch of the augmented reality Layar Vision app to "recognize real-world objects and then trigger digital content based on that object"
• The GEB shares satellite imagery on the Japanese Tsunami that created some massive icebergs
• MacRumors details an Apple patent on schematic maps: "[...] a new maps application that could display a simplified subset of information most relevant to a user seeking specific information or routing."
• In special remote sensing news, Slashdot mentions a camera reaching its target by being thrown by a grenade launcher
• MapQuest tells us how free listing works on their MapQuest Local Business Center

In the maps category:

• O'Reilly discuss maps of the recent London riots
• Mapperz mentions the release of USGS historical maps