GeoTagging

I'm really in love with the concept of geotagged photos. These are photographs where the location of the camera is embedded with the digital actual photo stored on your memory card (in a digital camera). Before going on my recent trip, I assumed all the latest cameras had this feature, and almost bought one. What I was looking for was a high-quality point and shoot camera. My research told me only one model actually does this, and it's the Nikon P6000. It has a built-in GPS receiver and does geotagging. It's up to other software to take these codes and place them on a map or identify their location. In other words, the camera records 44 degrees north by 25 degrees west, and software like Flickr (for sharing photos) or Google Maps (for finding locations) identifies this location. Why are geotagged photos valuable? I think this is valuable because it's very useful metadata to have. "Here's a picture of Susan in front of this giant bridge, and yes, to get back here, go to these coordinates." But think of it this way... you can create a map where all of your photos were taken. Of course, it is possible to take geotagged photos with other equipment aside from the P6000. Many cell phones with GPS capabilities (including the iPhone and iPhone 3G) record geographical data, and many add-ons to higher-end cameras now add geotagging data (memory cards and battery grips). We were snapping away on part of the road trip off of the Golden Gate bridge and it would be nice (now) to know where those spots actually were. Imagine you were house hunting, and shooting candidates. You'd know precisely where those homes were. Of course, Google has already geotagged photos as part of their Street View program in Google Earth/Maps. But what makes geotagging compelling to me is this: If folks are sharing their own geotagged photos, we're building an enormous library of data about the world around us... what if GPS systems in cars could tap-into this data and show us the most recent photos from intersections, roadways, and points of interest? Social computing is still under development.