"A decade or so ago pundits (ourselves included) said the internet would mean the 'death of distance' and make the world 'flat,' i.e., eliminate geographical differences." So writes Adrian Wooldridge in The Economist. True? And if so, what role did and does GIS play in this change?

Web Map Solutions' Matt Sheehan suggested last month that the GIS industry is splitting. But apparently he was not sure since he put a question mark at the end of the blog post title. So, is the GIS world splitting?

This week’s article on the "Madness of Addressing" caused more debate than we’ve seen in a long time.

On July 14 at the Esri International User Conference, the company announced GeoNet, the new home for technical forums and a place for GIS users to come together to share ideas, insights and challenges. Now that it’s been up and running publicly for three months, we’ll take a look at GeoNet and its potential.

Microsoft seems to be finally making waves in geo: Bing Maps Favelas; Azure Search; Power BI Visualization. Does all this point to a renewed focus on geospatial for consumer and enterprise?

Why do students already involved in GIS have such a challenging time finding topics for papers? Why is it so hard, and how can educators and professionals help?

A team of researchers are using multispectral imaging to uncover hidden text on a 1491 Martellus map, one of the most important maps in history. Lead researcher Chet Van Duzer thinks the discoveries will allow historians and scholars to see just how the map influenced cartography in its time.

Image: "Henricus Martellus' World Map" by Henricus Martellus (Heinrich Hammer) - [1] [2]. Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Henricus_Martellus%27_World_Map.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Henricus_Martellus%27_World_Map.jpg

What will we do with all of the Apple sensors: NFC, HealthKit, HomeKit, LED Sensors, barometers. Will they portend the beginning of yet another big data assault that will impact geospatial professionals? Will they catapult the “connected home” or “quantified self” craze? How will we use these data? Will standards be part of the adoption and who will own them?

In this interview, Barbara Ryan, the Secretariat Director of the intergovernmental Group on Earth Observations (GEO) in Geneva, Switzerland. discusses the expansive mission of GEO with editor in chief Joe Francica. GEO provides information about earth science and technology for policy makers worldwide. GEO's Members include 92 Governments and the European Commission plus 67 intergovernmental agencies are. Projects range from the Asian Water cycle initiatives to Global Drought Early Warning to Biomass monitoring. After graduating from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Cortland with a degree in geology in 1974, Ms. Ryan joined the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and eventually became the associate director for geography at the USGS, responsible for the agency�s remote sensing, geography and civilian mapping programmes, including the Landsat satellites.

We see maps every day. They appear in online news stories and navigation apps. Do these maps meet your expectations?