OpenStreetMap

Website: www.openstreetmap.org

OpenStreetMap (OSM) is a free, editable map of the world, which allows users to view, edit and use geographical data in a collaborative way.

The OpenStreetMap Foundation (OSMF) is an international not-for-profit organisation supporting, but not controlling, the OpenStreetMap Project. OSM was founded in July 2004 by Steve Coast, a computer science graduate from University College London. In April 2006, the OSMF was established to encourage the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anybody to use and share.

In December 2006, Yahoo confirmed that OpenStreetMap could use its aerial photography as a backdrop for map production. The maps are created using data from portable GPS devices, aerial photography, other free sources or simply from local knowledge. Registered users can upload GPS track logs and edit the vector data using free GIS editing tools. By August 2008 there were over 50,000 registered contributors and by November 2011, this had risen to 500,000 registered users with around 3% contributing to content.