Translator: Michele Gianella Reviewer: Denise RQ
This is our world, the world we want to explore
to get a chance of living better and happier,
because this is what we all want.
However, we have to study this world to know it better,
and in order to study,
we first have to measure
the world we want to know, and then study it.
Studying the world means, in turn, measuring the world,
which is precisely what cartographers always dealt with.
Cartography has always dealt with measuring the world,
and then representing it, so we can know it.
This way of measuring the world has stayed the same for centuries:
these two pictures, as you can see,
were taken in different moments in history.
But world used to be mapped from below, anyway.
Then, at the beginning of the last century,
we started to fly,
thanks to Wright Brothers' experiments,
and we started to take images of our world from above,
first from the airplanes' wings, then from satellites - 1957, Sputnik -
and now a new era is beginning now, with Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.
Many people simply call them drones.
Let's go back to the satellites, today's cutting edge technology,
The last picture you see at the bottom right side
is the Worldview 3 satellite.
Worldview 3 flies rather low,
just about 600 km up there.
It's equipped with many sensors, among which there's a particular one,
a camera with which, we use to joke about,
the Earth takes selfies.
These images are peculiar and spectacular,
because even at 600 km of distance, we still can take Earth's images
with a resolution of 30 cm.
So, any object on the Earth's surface
that's bigger than 30 cm, is captured by Worldview 3,
but Worldview 3 is not the only satellite to monitor the Earth.
Here's a picture of the Earth surrounded by its operating satellites.
It doesn't include all the bodies orbiting around the Earth,
or we should add the so-called "debris",
out-of-service satellites.
Each of those operational satellites has many sensors,
and they monitor the Earth in real time.
However, we have to say that we cannot take these pictures
and immediately use them to map our Earth,
because, despite our computers' impressive "intelligence"
they aren't yet, and they'll probably never be,
as intelligent as humans, therefore we still need
someone to put her eyes and brain
on these pictures, in order to interpret them.
Cartography has changed very much, over the years,
from a technological standpoint.
But its mission has also changed very much.
Initially, cartography was developed for military or cadastral purposes,
namely to map the world
and impose taxation on properties.
Then things began changing in the 70s,
and cartography got used for different purposes,
like urban planning, land planning and so on.
But the real revolution happened 11 years ago – in 2004.
In 2004, a project called OpenStreetMap saw the light,
the brainchild of Steve Coast,
the guy you see here.
He had just graduated in computer science at the University College of London.
Together with his friends,
he started to work on this project
of the world's first free map.
Their main idea
spreads across the world immediately,
mostly thanks to the movement
for free and open source informative systems
and geographic information, who immediately espoused the idea.
Starting from just few contributors at the beginning of 2004,
now they've grown up to more than 2 millions.
2 millions of people worldwide,
who map the world cooperatively.
What are Steve's and OpenStreetMap's main ideas?
Firstly, the idea is that the geographic information
--once called cartography, but now, in modern terms,
is referred to as geographic information--
is getting pervasive:
more and more events and phenomena
only get their meaning when geographically contextualized.
Practical uses are car driving,
now increasingly aided with satellite navigators and maps,
the individual navigation which will be more and more important,
the location-based services, which are just beginning.
A second key idea
is that if we want to use these data,
if we want these data to be free,
we have to create them by ourselves.
So, the main OpenStreetMap motto
is that OpenStreetMap is created by people like you,
to be freely used by anyone in the world.
And how can we create these maps?
They can be created individually, but it's much more funny
and beautiful to make them together,
and so we can organize Mapping parties.
This is the first word I want you to learn.
Mapping parties means meeting
and mapping together with an aim, such as the one you see on this picture.
This is a mapping party in Osaka, to make the resilience map,
so people, scientists, administrators,
members of the local civil protection and so on,
meet, go around the city and identify the areas
to count on in case of emergencies, the critical areas etc.,
and they make a resilience map.
The motto is map the world.
But I want to tell you another story,
the history of the terrible earthquake that destroyed Haiti.
Someone had to do something,
but one should have known how to move
on a territory whose morphology changed after the earthquake.
Some groups connected to OpenStreetMap, had the idea
of getting satellite images at high resolution,
with the help of the international organizations,
uploaded these images on the OpenStreetMap platform
which is a very technologically advanced platform.
As you remember,
Steve Coast is a computer scientist and remember that all was born
in the free and open source geographic information movement.
So the platform is very complex, but its use is very easy,
anyone can use it, there's no need to be a nerd,
the platform is suitable for children and even for grandparents.
So, these new images of the modified Haiti
were put on this platform and a call was launched around the world.
All the volunteers mapped
and in few hours the map of Haiti was ready.
That fundamental map helped understand how to move on the territory
and helped save human lives.
After the event, task forces were formed all over the world
and whenever a catastrophic event occurs,
all the volunteers start mapping
and make a layout of the reshaped territory.
However, we don't need to go farther for these things:
the picture you see describes
what happened here in Como
at Politecnico Di Milano last springtime after Nepal's earthquake.
We met and there were many people, we learned how to map all together
and we also contributed to create the map
that volunteers needed to intervene in Nepal.
I have to say you are very lucky
because this TEDx is held
at the beginning of the Geographical Awareness Week.
A week decided by all those OSM organizations
somehow dealing with OpenStreetMap.
Starting from 15th,
there will be at least 100 events around the world.
Mapping events, which we call Mappathon,
which is the second word I want you to learn.
Mappathon means meeting all together in a place,
everyone with a PC because this is fundamental,
to map all together,
So if you are interested, next Thursday,
not faraway, in Milan, at Politecnico Di Milano,
we will hold a mappathon,
and what will we deal about?
If we are unlucky there will be an emergency
and we will work on that emergency;
but if we are lucky, and nothing will happen,
we will work on another beautiful project called Missing Maps.
The Missing map project is about those neglected areas,
which are also fragile areas because of natural catastrophes
or of other types of disasters that may happen.
In general, they are also the world's poorest areas
and so they don't have our infrastructures and tools.
What we can do during these mappathons
is to make the maps of those areas around the world, in order to be ready
should any catastrophe occur.
This community, this big and generous community,
mostly made by volunteers, doesn't only deal with mapping
in preparation to disasters or during the disasters:
we want to do something more,
we want to have a positive attitude towards what happens.
So, there are several other ways of mapping our world.
Time is running out, so I only quote two alternatives:
The first one is biodiversity, especially in urban sector.
We can't, nor we should, think that biodiversity
is only in those faraway corners we don't know:
there's also a biodiversity very close to us
and we must learn about it, appreciate it, and take care of it.
Urbangene project comes
from Lausanne's Swiss Federal Institute of Technology.
For this project, all collaborators are asked
to take a computer
and put in all the data on biodiversity around Lausanne.
The second way of mapping is based in Italy,
it is a cultural and touristic project,
but a different kind of tourism, called slow tourism.
Slow tourism is similar to slow food,
in that it implies a mindful use of the territory.
We don't want to invade the territory,
but rather slowly move across it,
walking around, riding, biking,
so we can look around, and we can discover
all the richness of the territory around us,
richness that may have values only in our own eyes
and may not have been taken into consideration by other people.
Or we can start to check
if there are emergencies, and speak out.
All these things are summed up in a project
called "I cammini Della via Regina"
Via Regina is an historical path,
which starts in Italy and goes on to Northern Europe.
Via Regina road already existed in Roman times
and many people walked through it.
From via Regina, located along the western side of Como Lake,
many paths start and go towards Switzerland,
borders paths that are rich in culture and history,
where pilgrims, smugglers and people like us walked through.
We wanted to add
a part of collaborative mapping to via Regina project,
so there's an app you can find connecting to the Via Regina website.
Going around these areas you can use this app
and add your information
so that these pieces of information are immediately mapped
and available for everyone online,
making a collaborative map, which grows day by day.
In conclusion, as you can see,
there are many chances to join us with these mapping projects.
Once the cartographers used to leave and go around
to explore and map new worlds.
Now cartographers can stay at home
and take the world home and in their city.
And why do we do it?
Because all together want to participate
and make a more free, shared, participated world.
So if you liked one of these stories, you can join us.
Now is your turn to be the next cartographers.
(Applause)