Esri has agreed to pay $2.3 million in back wages and will review its compensation system and provide training as part of a conciliation agreement with the U.S. Department of Labor, the department announced yesterday. The case dates to 2017, when, in the course of a federal compliance evaluation, the department alleged that Esri engaged in systemic pay discrimination, paying 176 female employees less than their male counterparts. Esri entered into the conciliation agreement voluntarily.
Tag: Esri
Esri’s New Giant Globe
“When you are a global Geographic Information Technology company with a globe in your logo, you don’t shy away from the opportunity to have a great big glorious 8.5-foot diameter illuminated rotating globe in your new office building. But what sort of globe cartography do you design? How should this gigantic model of our lovely home planet appear?” John Nelson and Sean Breyer explain the design and construction process behind Esri’s new globe—a custom Earthball manufactured by Orbis World Globes.
Mapping with Purpose
In “Mapping with Purpose,” Heather Smith of Esri uses blueberry crops in Canada to make a very good point about mapmaking. “You have data, but that’s not enough to make a map. You also need a purpose. There’s no point in making a map unless you have something to say.” In other words: If you’re going to map blueberry production, why? Is it to compare the acreage of blueberry-producing regions? To compare it to other berry crops? A map is a statement: what are you trying to say? [Kenneth Field]
Behind the Scenes at the JHU Coronavirus Dashboard
ArcGIS-based dashboards tracking the spread of the novel coronavirus are now reasonably common, but the first was produced by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering. As Nature Index reports in this behind-the-scenes look at the JHU coronavirus dashboard, the decision to launch was spur of the moment, but now the dashboard and its underlying data get more than a billion hits every single day, and it is now managed by a team that numbers nearly two dozen. [GIS Lounge]
Five Ways Maps Can Help Communities Respond to COVID-19
Este Geraghty, Esri’s chief medical officer, suggests five ways that maps can help communities respond to COVID-19. Very much in a GIS context: putting data on a map and letting users—officials in this case—make decisions based on that data.
When Mobile Maps Can’t Keep Up with Road Closures
During a natural disaster like Hurricane Florence, crisis maps can be an invaluable source of information about road and bridge closures and other infrastructure outages. Trouble is, that information doesn’t always trickle down to mobile phones, which is where most people get their maps. (Especially when authorities have trouble keeping up with road closures on their own maps.) CityLab’s Clare Tran explores this question, looking at, for example, how Waze incorporates road closure data from Esri and its volunteers.
Coming Soon: Kenneth Field’s Open Online Course on Cartography
Esri will be hosting a free, six-week massive open online course (MOOC) on cartography later this year. Called Cartography., it’s taught by Kenneth Field and coincides with the release of Field’s textbook of the same name.
Each weekly lesson in the Cartography. MOOC focuses on the creation of one exemplary map that draws together key cartographic ideas. Lessons consist of about two hours of content, including video discussions, guided and self-guided exercises using ArcGIS Pro and ArcGIS Online, quizzes, interactions between students and instructors, and supplemental resources. Participants who engage with all the course content will receive a certificate of completion and a discount code to purchase Cartography., the book, should they wish to continue their learning.
Registration opens on 18 April and continues until 2 May. It is, as I mentioned, free; Esri expects more than 10,000 people to sign up.
Cartography., the book, is currently scheduled to come out in June.
Mapping Hurricane Harvey’s Impact
The Washington Post maps rainfall and flooding levels in the Houston area.
The New York Times is collecting several maps on two web pages. The first page deals with subjects like rainfall, river level, current and historical hurricane tracks, damage reports, and cities and counties under evacuation orders. Maps on the second page look at Harvey’s impact on the Houston area.
Esri’s U.S. Flooding Public Information Map includes precipitation and flood warnings.
#Harvey in perspective. So much rain has fallen, we've had to update the color charts on our graphics in order to effectively map it. pic.twitter.com/Su7x2K1uuz
— National Weather Service (@NWS) August 28, 2017
Kenneth Field critiques the National Weather Service’s decision to add more colours to their precipitation maps (see above). “Simply adding colours to the end of an already poor colour scheme and then making the class representing the largest magnitude the very lightest colour is weak symbology. But then, they’ve already used all the colours of the rainbow so they’re out of options!”
Esri Makes Satellite Imagery Available to OpenStreetMap Editors
Esri is making its satellite imagery collection available to OpenStreetMap editors.
Today Esri is proud to announce that we are making our own global collection of satellite imagery available to the OSM community directly through our existing World Imagery Service. This regularly updated resource provides one meter or better satellite and aerial photography in many parts of the world, 15m TerraColor imagery at small and mid-scales (~1:591M down to ~1:72k), 2.5m SPOT Imagery (~1:288k to ~1:72k), 1 meter or better NAIP in the US and many other curated sources, so we know it will make a welcome addition to OSM’s growing catalog of reference layers.
OSM editors have been able to trace maps from satellite imagery for years; other sources of such imagery have included Bing and Yahoo (back when Yahoo Maps was a thing). Different sources have different strengths, so this can only help the project. (Esri’s imagery makes no difference where I am, but that’s not a surprise.)
2016 Map Gallery Results
Esri has announced the results of their 2016 Map Gallery competition. The top three maps in a number of different categories are posted on this page. Nearly 700 maps were submitted for the contest by attendees at last month’s Esri User Conference. [Esri]
Esri’s Solar System Atlas
Esri’s Solar System Atlas collects maps of all the planets, dwarf planets, moons, asteroids and comets that have been visited by spacecraft in one location. (At least the ones with solid surfaces.) Now keep in mind that maps of other objects in the solar system are generally spacecraft imagery stitched together into a mosaic and displayed on a map projection, and this is mostly what is presented here (plus some colourized topographic maps and a few geologic maps). Not many of the maps are labelled, which is a shame: bare imagery isn’t terribly useful. Also, the map tiles load slowly, and zooming out doesn’t always refresh them. But as a concept, I’m all for this. More from Esri’s Matt Artz. [via]
‘The Unlikeliest of Tech Moguls’
Forbes has a profile of Esri and its 70-year-old founder, Jack Dangermond, which continues to thrive despite the arrival of Google and other entrants in the digital mapping arena.
[A]s Google aimed its maps mostly at consumers, Esri was able to hold on to its revenue base among power users in business, government and other organizations. Google is great for directions or locating your home on Zillow. But if you are, say, the Bavarian police charged with securing the G7 Summit near Munich and need a detailed real-time dashboard that can pinpoint every delegation, police officer, emergency vehicle, first responder, protest site, road closure, mountain trail and access point to the summit’s venue, you’ll use Esri. Last year Google pulled the plug on a halfhearted push into enterprise maps and began moving its customers to Esri.
Notable that Esri has stayed private rather than raising capital through the stock market, which in the tech sector is just unbelievable. Its estimated value is $3 billion.
Cartographic Summit
Esri and the International Cartographic Association are hosting the Cartographic Summit: Future of Mapping, which takes place next week, 8-10 February, at Esri headquarters in Redland, California. It looks like the sessions will be streamed online. [via]
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