I was recently interviewed for a podcast. I will share more when it is released as there are a few in the pipeline that I am very excited about. In a great conversation, with a great podcast host, you can easily forget that you have an audience. An audience that is far from homogenous so I made a list of topics that might appeal to folks interested in geospatial analytics.
It sounds easy but only if you think of two simplified but fairly accurate buckets of geospatial professionals. In one bucket you have the geospatial professionals that have an academic background in an university setting.They have studied theory, application, engineering, and perhaps a specific enterprise or open-source tool has emerged as their preferred platform. In the other bucket you can find deep subject expertise in medicine, public health, environment, finance, public policy--the list is vast. Along the way, the discovery has been made that “where” something is occurring on the earth’s surface might hold clues and insights that can become actionable. Geospatial tools start to bubble up to the forefront and the research and education become colocated in the question formulation. No more big data for the sake of volume. We now start exploring with a specificity and focus. I belong to this latter group. Google Earth Timelapse Glacial Retreat Alaska
While preparing for my podcast debut I pulled my thesis off of the shelf in my office. Constraints of Landscape Pattern and Fish Mobility on Ecologic Genetics of Lake Trout (Salvelinus namaycush) and Arctic Char ((Salvelinus alpinus) in Arctic Watersheds. I used microsatellites (genetic markers that follow inheritance patterns of genes) to measure the genetic distance in fish populations as a proxy for the mathematical basis for evolutionary theory. I may even have introduced the geomorphic tropic hypothesis model to my readers--gasp. The model is a decision tree that predicts where certain species are located based on characteristics of the landscape.
This bit of forgotten history did reveal a deep interest in cartography. I hired a cartographer to create maps for my thesis and was invited to watch his work. I might honestly say he still is one of the most interesting people I ever met. He introduced me to ebay before it was a big thing. He hunted for old maps with a depth and skill that was admirable. One of his unrelated finds was a coin machine recovered from an old motel that would allegedly shake the mattress if you fed it enough quarters. Years later his girlfriend at the time was a student of mine and we laughed at this shared absurdity. Chris also downloaded the theme of Sanford and Son to my old windows computer so I wouldn’t have to listen to the default chimes. For years, when I launched my computer the distinctive song would play loudly and make me smile. What has evolved is a deep appreciation for geospatial analysis--and Fred Sanford.
The fast fish, not the big fish, eats the small fish. Ali Babacan
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