It’s very difficult to describe what we are aiming for with the Mapovino project without getting caught up in Web2.0 buzzword bingo; or, going the other route, being so pretentious that it’s we’re sooo different that we shun any words that sound vaguely like the “read-write web”. Sigh. Below are my best thoughts in words so far….
(We’re having a demo and wine-tasting in San Francisco soon. Contact me if you’re interested!)
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Mapovino is a wine-mapping website incorporating GoogleMaps to showcase geographically distinct wines and the stories behind these wines.
Mapovino is interactive:
- Users can add comments, photos, link to maps in their blogs, and even add blog links on the map.
Mapovino is encyclopedic:
- It will pull wine and geography information from Wikipedia and other public information sources. This secondary user-generated content further enables users to interact with Mapovino.
Mapovino is information and referral:
- Mapovino will not sell wines; instead, it will point to where to find the wine in stores and restaurants.
Mapovino will be driven by wine fans, helped by Mapovino staff:
- Producers will not have the burden entering information about their wines and vineyards - fans of their wines can help input that information. Mapovino staff will highlight producers, and post in-depth articles and interviews. Producers can control their own entries, but do not have to do anything specific for their wines to appear on the site.
Mapovino is in development:
- To be part of the conversation, please email “greg.beuthin” in front of “@af83.com”
Hello Greg,
This project is very exciting. So as to push people contributing I suggest a public license (such as GPL or CC).
Did you envisage to use Openstreetmap.org rather than Google maps? If so why did you prefer Google maps?
This is an excellent point. For user-generated content - that lives on the Mapovino servers - it will likely be Creative Commons. That would include comments, photos (that are not hosted elsewhere), and even user maps.
We plan to use Google maps - for now. Primarily because one of th most exciting things is to see the satellite image of the landscape around the vineyard - and OSM does not have good enough data about that right now (yes, this includes Yahoo’s satellite imagery overlaid on OSM).
*However* I just came back from WhereCamp, were I learned about OpenLayers - which allows us to plug in Google (for now) until something better comes along - like good CC satellite images, then we can switch out.
More on what I learned at WhereCamp - on this blog, soon!
What type of geographic information are you planning on putting on these maps?
Well, a bunch!
We want to focus on appellation and then winemaker and grape grower location to start.