I just now revisited the Gombe Chimpanzee Blog, which posts its content exclusively to Google Earth, only to find that all of Gombe National Park on the shore of Lake Tanganyika in western Tanzania is now in glorious high resolution. This must have happened in the data update from a month ago. It makes visiting this blog all the more worthwile.
But the enhanced resolution also drives home that Gombe Chimpanzee Blog could really use a makeover. It already has the content, which is the hardest part. Why not deliver the posts via a network link, so that we can subscribe? And why not add to this network link some static overlays that identify the main villages and most frequented spaces, so that mentions of them in a post aren’t as cryptic? With the improved resolution, all this now really matters. With a few hours of invested time, this blog could really become the alpha male of georeferenced blogging.
Nice idea. Did you consider contacting them? :)
I guess I could, but then there’d be nothing to blog about:-) Also, I’m assuming that all bloggers obsesively track site statistics. I may be wrong, of course.
“alpha male of georeferenced blogging”? Groan…baaaaad boy…no banana for you today… :)
Hi I just wanted to stop in and give you all a quick update on the Gombe Chimpanzee Blog.
We worked with Google (along with help from DigitalGlobe) to get the new high resolution imagery posted to Google Earth. And we are really excited about the new canvas we have to work with.
We are really happy to see recommendations like the one’s in your posting above and hope that you and your readers will continue to post such recommendations.
In terms of our immediate plans for the blog we are working with our Gombe staff to identify a number of research locations and historical spots to make available as overlays — including information on the functions of various buildings at the research base camp, the location of Jane’s original home, environmental markers and a number of other spots that we think the public may find interesting as a context to the postings that our researchers submit to us.
In the long run we are hoping to integrate links to research video, short stories in Jane’s voice and a number of other cool applications that are in the works.
We are really glad that everybody is enjoying our blog. Creating it has been a really exciting process and we look forward to bringing you more content in the future.
-Bryce