The official MapQuest blog introduces open.mapquest.

From the announcement: "After the successful launches of 10 open-sourced maps in Europe and Asia in partnership with OpenStreetMap (OSM), MapQuest is proud to launch its U.S. site located at Open.Mapquest. [...] Open.Mapquest provides the same features as our 10 sites in Europe and Asia, and also debuts a new error-reporting tool (which has been added to all of MapQuest’s open sites).  For many, this tool may be their first step in becoming OSM contributors."

Here's the weekly batch of geonews, finally on a regular Friday.

On the ESRI front:

• Recently, ESRI open sourced the ESRI Geoportal Server. Some twitter users were quick to mention that you still need ArcGIS Server software to use the Geoportal Server. [UPDATE: see comments below, it seems such a license is not a requirement after all.] To me, that's still a nice step. Their definition of a geoportal: "A geoportal is a gateway to Web-based geospatial resources, enabling users to discover, view and access geospatial information and services made available by their providing organizations. Likewise, data providers can use the geoportal to make their geospatial resources discoverable, viewable, and accessible to others."
• The popular blog SpatiallyAdjusted shares some elements that could be improved about the ArcGIS 10 user interface

On the open source front:

• O'Reilly discusses a new open source software called WEAVE (Web-based Analysis and Visualization Environment), which obviously include a mapping component
• If you're into FDO, you'll be happy to learn of the new SequentialProcess for batch mode processing
• QGIS gets new label tools
• Remember Polymaps? The open source mapping framework Polymaps is now integrated into GeoCommons

In the miscellaneous category:

• REST and RESTful was widely discussed in the past few years in the geospatial community, including within ESRI, the open source and OGC rings. Thanks to this entry named Richardson Maturity Model: steps toward the glory of REST, I think I finally correctly understand what REST is about! ;-) (sorry I don't remember how I ended up on that article)
• TMR informs us MapQuest launched My Maps last June, with the same name of the similar feature provided on Google Maps, basically allowing you to save and share user-created maps
• SS shares a long perspective entry named What forces are at play in the evolution of geospatial industry sectors?
• NAVTEQ acquires the 3D modeling company named PixelActive
• APB informs us Yahoo has launched a new service called Local Offers: "that it said will give users information about local merchants along with coupons and information on deals at stores in their neighborhoods."
• Kurt shares interesting thoughts on GIS, followed by What is GIS? A workflow definition

In the maps category:

• Here's the evolution of active Facebook users by region
• A nice entry on The Human Development Index in Africa and Across the World
• SS shares an entry named Mapping Opportunity in America
• While I was aware of it, we mentioned mentioned it yet. The GEB discusses the USGS "Earth as Art" beautiful collection of Landsat imagery

I wasn't available to share the recent geonews in batch mode last Friday, so there you go!

On the Google front:

• Google Places is now more widely available in Asia
• New in Google Maps for Android: Latitude real-time updating and more
• Via APB, there's a 'big buttons' version of the Google Maps UI that is being tested

On the Microsoft front:

• Bing Maps' latest map app is OnTerra’s “RouteSavvy” Route Optimizer, allowing you to find the best route for multiple destinations (think solving the travelling salesman problem)
• IDV's Visual Fusion 5.0 has been released, it integrates with Microsoft tools such as Bing Maps and Sharepoint

On the open source / data front:

• Here's an important entry if you use ExtJS or GeoExt, it's about the licensing limitations of GeoExt depending on your use case
• Here's a blog entry on how do OpenStreetMap and open government geodata fit together
• There's WMS cascading in the latest GeoServer
• Here's an interesting entry named Latest on JPEG2000 Improved Support for the Java world

On the ESRI front:

• An entry named Esri Forestry Group Aims to Create Open Templates and Tools
• Here's two entries from V1 on ESRI's Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) conference, one named “All Roads Lead to Rome” and a second one named Thought – Is ESRI Building a Search Engine?

In the miscellaneous category:

• Here's an entry on a disagreement of the value of REST for geodata processing and the OGC
• We mentioned China's MapWorld recently, here's more info and a note that it uses DigitalGlobe imagery
• Here's a free set of online calculators for geographic coordinates and distances
• It seems that Vans can Drive Themselves Across the World and another geo-related discussion over Slashdot: Forming New Mobile Networks With People-Borne Sensors
• Here's news from LizardTech: Next Generation MrSID Technology Offers Enhanced Compression Technology for Hyperspectral Data
• I liked this short tidbit letting us know that a "trial in New South Wales revealed that a GPS device that beeped when drivers were over the local speed limit (access from a database, not input by drivers as other devices require) caused 89% of drivers to slow down."
• Also from APB: MapQuest Visits Down 22% over Last Year
• And if you like editwars, "Neogeography" has been deleted from Wikipedia
• And ending up the serie from APB, updating a NAVTEQ in-dash GPS can cost you more than the value of a new handheld GPS device
• Why not, Australian Researchers Design Software to Help Robots Read Maps

In the maps category:

• The Wikileaks Iraq War Logs Mapped
• Here's an interesting entry named The Surprising Geography of International Tourism
• Here's a review of the new National Geographic Atlas
• Here's about the Berlin Solar Atlas project
• The One Europe One Geology book is now online

Here's a few recent open source geospatial software and open data news.

On the open data front:

• MapQuest continues to dive into OpenStreetMap
• Here's an interesting graph on OpenStreetMap data accuracy per contributors density
• Denver will host the State of the Map Conference, at the same place and same month than the OSGeo's FOSS4G Conference.
• Here's an entry named Wikipedia makes OpenStreetMap more prominent
• There's a few entries a critique of OpenStreetMap, another specifically on city labels in OSM
• The Wall Street Journal estimates Open Source Mapping Poses Threat For TomTom, Nokia
• Here's OpenHeatMap, an online tool for creating heat maps and choropleth maps

On the open source software front:

• Shapely 1.2.6 has been released
• OpenGeo won a contract with UK's Odnance Survey
• Here's an entry on using QGIS on Windows with ECW
• And an entry about kml 2.2 in gvSIG

Here's recent geonews in batch mode.

On the ESRI front:

• ArcGIS Mapping For Microsoft SharePoint 2.0 Now Available
• ArcGIS API For iOS 1.0 Now Available
• Latest Software And Firmware Versions To Use With ArcPad 10
• And an entry on creating a web application using ArcGIS
• James Fee encountered a limitation of the ESRI's EDN developer licenses when trying to test on multiple OS

In the miscellaneous category:

• OpenStreetMap editor named Potlatch version 2 is almost ready to be the default OSM editor
• MapQuest launched the MapQuest Atlas
• An entry on New Features for Bing Maps REST Services
• Here's an interesting entry on comparing image compression formats such as MrSID, jpeg, jpeg, GeoTIFFs and ECW
• The FGT blog offers a nice entry on online GPS satellite geometry error predictions tools
• APB mentions that SAP now have their own augmented reality app
• They also have an entry on tying a credit card to a cell phone location for location-based fraud protection
• The U.S. EPA GeoData Gateway website is now available to all

In the maps category:

• GeoCurrents shares an entry on the dangers of mapping religions, in an entry focusing on Islam mapping
• Here's a map of the gangs of New York

Here's the now traditional weekly dose of geonews in batch mode. On the ESRI front:

• ArcGIS Viewer For Flex 2.1 Now Available
• There's an new white paper on GIS In The Cloud, The Esri Example

On the Google front:

• Here's an entry on AlterEarth, a new gaming platform for Google Earth, and yes, you can play Grand Theft Auto on Earth
• The Google elevation service now available in the Maps API for Flash

On the open data / open source front:

• MapQuest adds OpenStreetMap data of four more countries: Spain, Italy, Germany and France
• Here's GeoSpatial for Java Workbooks available

In the LBS category:

• O'Reilly links to locationlabs' Universal Location Service: "Remotely locate 250+ million phones. The Universal Location Service [ULS] aggregates location access across major tier 1 carriers including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon."
• A friend sent me a link to a small entry stating that your Facebook friends can check you in to places
• O'Reily also have an entry on a crowdsourced and location-aware bird watching app called BirdsEye
• Here's an entry on a Offline Map Viewer And GPS Tracker For Android

In the miscellaneous category:

• Emma wrote to let us know Slashgeo is amongst their top 50 Scholarly Blogs for Climate Science Students
• Bing Maps is now integrated directly in some HP printers
• I forgot that share that one before, you can now embed MapQuest maps on websites
• Arctic Web is a site to look for geospatial data of the artic
• You can now map your LinkedIn connections via a third-party

In the maps category:

• TMR has an entry on the National Geographic's Maps of the Gulf of Mexico's Oil Infrastructure
• Slashdot discussed a story named "Microwave Map of Entire Moon Revealed"

Here's a few recent OpenStreetMap news:

• MapQuest has launched an open directions service using OpenStreetMap data, we did mention the new MapQuest relation with OSM recently (in our still unavailable archives)
• There's a new book named "OpenStreetMap - Be you own cartographer" by Jonathan Bennett
• There's another one coming soon named "OpenStreetMap - Using and enhancing the free map of the world" by Frederik Ramm and Jochen Topf
• Waze apologized for inadvertedly infringing on OSM data and quickly corrected the situation
• Finally, the OpenStreetMap community has reached 300,000 contributors