Spatialworlds: January 2012

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Rich information: Real time and spatial

Left image:Crossing the bridge at going home time.
Right image: Cityscape from a room above, Sydney.

Related sites to the Spatialworlds project
Spatialworlds website
21st Century Geography Google Group
Australian Geography Teachers' Association website
'Towards a National Geography Curriculum' project website
Geography Teachers' Association of South Australia website
Email contact
manning@chariot.net.au

Where am I??
Adelaide, Australia: S: 34º 55' E: 138º 36'

A new year welcome to Spatialworlds with this amazing real time spatial information site from Hungary. A great site of rich spatial information to start the Spatialworlds year.

Here is an amazing Emergency and Disaster Information site from Budapest, Hungary with the philosophy

"Nothing happens unexpectedly, everything has an indication,
we just have to observe the connections."

A philosophy that truly reflects the geographical concept of interconnection.

The Hungarian National Association of Radio Distress-Signalling and Infocommunications (RSOE) operates the Emergency and Disaster Information Service (EDIS) within the frame of its own website which has the objective to monitor and document all the events on the Earth which may cause disaster or emergency. The service uses the speed and the data spectrum of the internet to gather information. They monitor and process several foreign organisation's data to get quick and certified information.

The EDIS website operated together by the General-Directorate of National Disaster Management (OKF) and RSOE, in co-operation with the Crisis Management Centre of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, provides useful information regarding emergency situations and their prevention. Extraordinary events happening in Hungary, Europe and other areas of the World are being monitored in 24 hours per day. All events processed by RSOE EDIS are displayed near real time - for the sake of international compatibility - according to the CAP protocol on a secure website.

To ensure clear transparency all events are categorized separately in the RSS,XML, CAP directory (e.g. earthquake, fire, flood, landslide, nuclear event, tornado, volcano). RSOE EDIS also contributes in dissemination of the CAP protocol in Hungary.

Beside the official information, with the help of special programs nearly 9-1000 internet press publications are monitored and the publication containing predefined keywords are processed. However, these "news" cannot be considered as official and reliable information, but many times critical information is gathered from the internet press. They screen the incoming information and store in a central database sorted by category.

If the world was 100 people

This excellent video, one of my favourites to get the message across to students re: the nature and dimensions of human geography, has been updated and is up on YouTube for classroom use.

Educational think piece

An older but goody, always worth another look.

Spatialworlds

Friday, January 13, 2012

The line between pleasure and pain!

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Rich information: Real time and spatial