Mapping the World

http://nerds.airbnb.com/mapping-world/

by achariam • 12 years ago

78 18 12 years ago

nerds.airbnb.com

zirkonit• 12 years ago

Nothing particularly special, every travel startup has some internal DB/toolset to (re)create proper geoschema.

Front-end tooling is pretty nice, though; I believe content editors' productivity using AT-AT is much higher than using some of the tools I've written :)

mtmail• 12 years ago

Love it. I hope they're able to publish the data. If only parts of it are generated using Google Maps data (see the 'create' feature in the screenshots) then they wouldn't because it's derived work.

Here is Flickr equivalent http://code.flickr.net/2008/10/30/the-shape-of-alpha/ (downloadable). Foursquare also does similar work.

[edit: sorry, I thought Airbnb was analyzing listing data to find the extends of neighborhoods. They don't seem to do that.]

meritt• 12 years ago

Zillow provides free neighborhood creative-commons boundaries btw: http://www.zillow.com/howto/api/neighborhood-boundaries.htm

toomuchtodo• 12 years ago

Has this data made its way into OSM yet?

untog• 12 years ago

Just using NYC, the Zillow data isn't perfect. But then, the larger point is that no-one even agrees what these different neighbourhoods are anyway, so it's very difficult to come up with a definitive data set.

freerk• 12 years ago

Looks nice, but I am disappointed they choose Google Maps over OpenStreetMap for this :)

jpatokal2• 12 years ago

As far as I can tell, they're only using Google Maps for the display layer, the actual polygons are entirely theirs.

rmc4• 12 years ago

If you draw polygons based on what you see on Google Maps (or any other copyrighted map), your polygons might be found to be a derived work of the original Google Map.

Otherwise, you could just trace all the roads on Google Maps to make your own $BLAH Maps, that's obviously not legal.

alex_duf• 12 years ago

I'm surprised they didn't even mention openstreetmap. I know airbnb is a for profit company but most likely neighborhoods and oceans are already mapped. (Europe is particularly well mapped)

jpatokal2• 12 years ago

OSM's convoluted licensing might expose them to the "risk" of having to contribute back their contributions though, plus (if they try to keep in sync) run the risk of others' changes running roughshod over their finely tuned model. This way they retain full control.

dbaupp• 12 years ago

It doesn't seem that they will have to contribute them back, just possibly, use the same license (which is possibly equivalent/just as bad):

You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt our data, as long as you credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors. If you alter or build upon our data, you may distribute the result only under the same licence. The full legal code explains your rights and responsibilities.

http://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright

Although IANAL, and it's not clear to me if rendering an independent set of data on top of the unchanged OSM data layer (i.e. effectively render two maps, on with some transparent sections) counts as building on top of the OSM database. So maybe they wouldn't even need to use the ODbL for their own data.

rmc4• 12 years ago

The absolute worst the OSM licence would require would be to allow people to download and distribute your dataset under ODbL. You are not required to enter it into the OSM database. At an absolute worst, you can maintain, and fully control the data, in this (ODbL licenced) dataset, without any worry of anyone changing it.

mandeepj• 12 years ago

When you’re exploring new places to experience, Airbnb Neighborhoods combines local editorial content with the handy, need-to-know information alongside professional photos to explore a place without having to leave your chair.

I see a conflict here. How can you explore a place without leaving your chair? (pun-intended)

rajacombinator• 12 years ago

How about before all this NLP mumbo jumbo they do something useful like simply let users sort by price, like every other hotel site. Or, you know, fix the rampant bugs.

Mapping the World

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