Virtual Earths and the Dominant Private Sector

[Nev]

So on a link from the Wikipedia I look a look at two "virtual globe" applications over the last two hours - NASA's, and Google's.

The NASA one I did first and thought it was cool to see satellite data where you could actually see highways, big buildings, etc., at the highest zoom factor, then scale out to the entire earth.

I just downloaded Google's a minute or two ago. You can see *cars*.

I am lending a lot more credence to the idea that in the future the major power players of the world are not going to be nations, they are going to be corporations. Admittedly, Google has a reputation for being one of the most tech-savvy companies on the planet, but if their privately developed app (the company used to be called Keyhole before getting bought by Google) can kick the crap out of NASA - NASA! - to this degree, I have to feel like it says a lot about the efficiency of the private sector.

[Kupek]

How much resources did NASA put into their application? How much resources did Keyhole/Google put into their application?

Without knowing the answer to those questions, is it possible to know which organization was more "effecient"?

[Nev]

Who knows? But take a look at each one. There is no way to deny that the Google app is a shitload better in most cases.

[Kupek]

"Better" is not the metric you were using. You mentioned "efficiency," which is a different beast entirely.

[Nev]

Hulk smash!

I was using the word in the "who's better at bringing a more fully-featured and higher-quality app to market faster" sense.

[Kupek]

I think you're missing my point. If you're going to draw conclusions about private vs. public sector, then you need to take into account more than just the end product itself. If Keyhole/Google used significantly more resources on their application (and I suspect they did), then it's not valid to say that the private sector is better at it.

[Nev]

Why? One of the big things about this trend is that the private sector seems to increasingly *have* more resources to spend on things than the public sector.

[Kupek]

If by "things" you mean cool, whiz-bang products that are fun to use but have little actual utility, then okay. Google and Keyhole are for-profit companies, and try to make things people will want to have or use. NASA is a federal organization which does not make products for market, but provides services and infrastructure that the public needs. They are also closely involved with research, which I won't claim the public <i>needs</i>, but it is something that the private sector is less likely to do because there's no guarenteed profit. (This argument gets fuzzy because Google does a decent amount of CS research, and a lot of CS research has come from the huge technology companies. But there's more to research than CS.)

There are many things that NASA does that wouldn't get done in the private sector because they don't generate a profit. And, in the case of a virtual globe application, there isn't much of a need for it, so NASA won't spend as much resources on developing one.

[Nev]

Not true. Google's Virtual Earth thing is the best map I've ever seen. It's like Google maps (with driving directions) on five kinds of anabolic steroids.

You can also use it to see other things, from geopolitical boundaries to good restaurants.

NASA's thing has some visual filters for climate and other scientific data (rainfall, etc.), and I don't know if Google Earth has similar functionality, but I wouldn't be surprised.

The virtual globe thing is massively useful. Consider a climatologist working on a project that requires comparing data across several regions, a junior state department official who now has a constantly-updated and three-dimensional representation of national boundaries, and just about anyone anywhere in the U.S. or Canada who now has perfect directions and practically an entire city guide for every city in the U.S. at his/her computer.

[Kupek]

In the danger of repeating myself, none of those fall under the main purposes of NASA, hence their application probably was produced using less resources.

[Don]

It's not clear to me how Virtual Earth is profitable.

[Nev]

The free version sure isn't, but Google offers a pay service that offers GPS and other things I didn't really pay attention to.

[Nev]

In the danger of repeating myself, none of those fall under the main purposes of NASA, hence their application probably was produced using less resources.

I'll concede the point. Perhaps I should get over my "the government has unlimited funds and can do anything" knee-jerk emotional response, since if I'm actually thinking I know that to be ridiculously far from the truth.

By the way, if anyone hasn't checked out Google Earth, I would almost mandate that as something that must be done. You can turn on layers which show you all of a particular type of business in your area - banks, movie theaters, grocery stores, etc. This is only one feature, but it's so massively useful that I'm in awe. This is going to be a huge part of my research on a new apartment later this year.

You can also store a personal database of places - say, for keeping track of family, or for business contacts. I'm sure you can also do a bunch of other things, but I'm still learning the program.