Google maps interface is being populated slowly with Bangladeshi towns
So far, detailed local roads of these following towns have been added to google maps:
Bagherhat
Chittagong
Cox's Bazar
Dhaka
Lal Monirhat
Patuakhali
Rajshahi
If you are not sure what we are talking about, go to this link:
http://maps.google.com and zoom in to Bangladesh and its different regions. If you zoom in enough, you will find the details of local roads of the above-mentions cities and towns already existing in the site.
Not sure, exactly how this incremental development is progessing, but it is pretty sure that it is not result of any centralized initiative that is responsible for this. Rather it shows the result of peoples' small initiatives on their part - a step at a time.
One could say it is very insignificant, whats the big deal about a local map of Patuakhali being uploaded to the Google maps? If you are one of those who ask the question, you are missing a big point.
It is the individual people who are ultimately responsible to decide our destiny, not the authority. Thats what is showing up in these individual efforts - slowly but surely.
Don't be surprised if one day find all the local maps of all the district towns and upazillas and unions show up in different maps software and are accessible to the whole world. A government initiative to make the digitized information available at different government owned site under e-governance initiative would make this transition fast. Hopefully someone in the government will make sure that its branches are not run with same mentality which left us without a submarine cable connection for a long time.
Also, these maps needs to be complemented by further information about historical artifacts, social / festival locations and natural locations that could be very useful for our planned social tourism and eco-tourism. On the national level, the maps still don't show the locations of forests - not even the Sundarbans.
Isn't it surprising that our tourism top-heads are campaigning among populace to vote for Sundarbans as one of the greatest natural wonders of the world, but we are not willing to share the very basic information (such as location of this natural wonder) with the world?
Also, there is another thing that is awaiting to happen.
We are yet to produce a locally hosted Bangla interface mapping portal to be used by the local people. We would hope somebody from our IT entreprenuers will soon rollout such a portal. If you want to consider to develop such a site - don't think its just a free labour. A proper business plan could make you earn a lot of money if you can develop a informative mapping interface of Dhaka or Chittogong with Bangla interface. Your exit strategy could be to develop the business groud up or you could be a target acquisiton of global players who are constantly looking for niche plays in emerging markets.
If you thought some of the ideas are worth of your reading time, please forward it to others. If you have an ear to the columnists in regular traditional media, please forward it to them. If you have an ear to the journalists and news editors of the electronic media, discuss it with them. Hope they would look at the suggestions and give due diligence.
Thanks for your time,
Innovation Line
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Note: This is a freelance column, published mainly in different internet based forums. This column is open for contribution by the members of new generation, sometimes referred to as Gen 71. If you identify yourself as someone from that age-group and want to contribute to this column, please feel free to contact. Thanks to the group moderator for publishing the article as Creative Commons contents.
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