My Geospatial Journey: From 90's Web GIS to Geospatial AI

I've been discussing for a number of years the evolution of geospatial. The start of my journey into the world of geospatial was through GIS. I moved to the US from the UK in the 90's. Unsure what to do for a career, I began visiting the University of Utah: Not enrolled, simply exploring. It was here that I bumped into the then nascent Internet (the U of U was on the original ARPANET). My head spun. The potential of networked computers, sharing content and building social networks was immense.

I knew this was the start of a technology revolution.

Next I came upon GIS: specifically ArcView and ArcInfo from Esri. Fascinating desktop/main frame map making technology, and sitting within the geography department (I am a passionate geographer).

My young 20-something year old brain, went into overdrive: "Suppose we brought together the Internet and GIS?" I pondered. I was determined to make it happen. The mechanism - a Masters degree in Web GIS. Now remember this was 1995. Few had heard of the Internet, even fewer GIS. But I had three challenges: persuading my professors this was a valid Masters area of study, learning how to programme computers, and finding software tools I could use to build what I envisaged.

The tenacity of youth knows no bounds. I managed to solve all 3 of of these problems and built a Web GIS application for the US Forest Service (they heard about my work and sponsored me).

So why tell you this story?

The emergence of the Internet was, as I believed when I first saw it, transformational. Mobile computing - smart phones - was similar; I have a story here which I will save for another day. It is my view that today we have entered a phase in terms of technology far more transformational than the Internet.

Geospatial 2.0

As I have shared, my introduction to geospatial was through GIS; that is both Esri and later open source GIS. I am wired as a geographer - curious, analytical, always trying to better understand the world around us. Though I cut my geospatial teeth on GIS, its focus on 2D maps and map making kept my enthusiasm lukewarm. I'm a geographer not a cartographer. I've always had a bigger vision for geospatial data and technology.

And that began my conversation around Geospatial 2.0.

I cannot take credit for the name - blame Josh Gilbert - but Geospatial 2.0 came with my realization that, thanks to new sensors, we were collecting a staggering amount of new geospatial data. And rather than converting that data into 2D (as has long been the case), we could now work in 3D and 4D (real-time). That would allow us to recreate the real world digitally.

Josh published his article on Geospatial 2.0 over 5 years ago. I have evolved his original thinking. We were both ahead of the game. Today it is hard to avoid mention of digital twins, real-time actionable intelligence, reality capture, digital reality, the metaverse. All at the heart of Geospatial 2.0.

The other key element both Josh and I recognized was the importance of new ways to process, analysis and ask questions of this data. To me that meant democratizing geospatial. In other words removing the need for an analyst in the middle, giving everybody the ability to ask a geospatial question and get back an answer instantaneously. That was artificial intelligence.

We are at the earliest stages of Geospatial 2.0. Generative AI has added a fascinating twist to the story; one certainly I did not see coming. But I believe generative geospatial AI will turbo charge Geospatial 2.0.

Another element I had not considered was spatial computing - that is the blending of the real world with the digital. For geospatial; augmented reality is the most important expression of that world. Robotics is another area. I now include both of these emerging field under the Geospatial 2.0 umbrella - why?

For augmented reality, think about seeing the world through smart glasses, these will allow us to view and understand things we are looking at; identifying the types of tree in our field of vision is a simple example.

How does this relate to geospatial?

To identify any object we need to know its location and attributes. This will be powered by geospatial AI.

As for robotics, geospatial AI will be the eyes of any robots which moves.

Closing Thoughts

Geospatial 2.0 began life as an umbrella term used to discuss the rapidly evolving world of geospatial. Beyond GIS, we included remote sensing, IoT, satellites/the space economy, AI and more. The pace of change of technology is staggering. As spatial computing and spatial intelligence emerge and grow, so too does Geospatial 2.0; encompassing these advances.

We live in exciting times. The age of Geospatial 2.0 is upon us.

Matt Sheehan?is a Geospatial 2.0 expert. He publishes a weekly Spatial-Next Newsletter which dives deeper into advances in the geospatial world, providing important news, opinions, new research and spotlights innovators. Subscribe to the newsletter?here.