A brief report back from the 2010 State of the Map Conference in sunny, hot Girona. It’s been an interesting and hectic day, with the conference opening on a business theme (as is usual for the Fridays of an OSM conference) – that meant lots of established and emerging commercial organisations pitching their interest in OSM and the occasional institutional plug – but it also raised interesting questions as to what direction OSM is taking. OSM’s activities are founded on community activity (virtual and actual), yet future viability seems to lie in commercial collaboration (after all, the coffee breaks are all sponsored by money-making parties); that does not necessarily entail subsumption by evil corporate behemoths, but it does put into focus OSM’s reason for being, and mode of operation. The only thing that can be concluded at this stage is predictably, ‘watch this space’ – OSM is undergoing changes in its licensing regime and time (and space) will tell as to what role vernacular knowledge has to play in the generation of OSM cartographies.

Elsewhere I met some very interesting people across OSM and academia, namely Yuwei Lin (conducting research into some of the motivations for involvement with OSM, amongst other open-source research), Muki Haklay, one of the few academics to be doing empirical work on OSM, Harry Wood, a leading light of OSM in London and OSM’s humanitarian response unit – and also Mikel Maron who has lead a project to generate an OSM map of Kibera, Kenya. Mikel’s project is impressive in its scope and ambition, but what really struck me was that he was acutely aware of the potential risk that OSM activities, unchecked, can lead to the re-inscription of problems and inequalities that OSM sought to overcome in the first place. Really interesting.

Just a word on the feeling of the conference, I’m amazed by the amount of people on their laptops during the conference talks – there is definitely a geekish element to it all, and unashamedly so – but it’s funny to see people tweeting during a talk “I’m learning about x, y & z, by Dr x, y & z”… when they’re doing anything but. Or perhaps I’m being overly-dismissive and they’re adept at multi-tasking. On the other hand, with the amount of wi-fi, Tweeting, Facebook-ing, and flickr-ing going on, however seemingly disruptive, it does make the conference feel live, electric, and dare I say, virtual.

Tomorrow sees the opening of the general conference, so there will be more input from the OSM ‘community’. Looking forward to it. The breaks are very long, but such is the Spanish way, and after some initial reservations with a 2.5 hr lunch break, I’m quite enjoying them – hasta manana!

Also – you can view the conference by live streaming, and catch constant updates by Twitter – just visit this page, here!