1. Some examples of SDIs and portals to them that were extant at the time of writing

2. Ground Zero site a few days after 9/11; the New York City Emergency Operations Center had been located in the World Trade Center complex and was destroyed (Courtesy James Tourtellotte/MAI/Landove LLC)

3. The depth of flooding in New Orleans as a consequence of Hurricane Katrina on August 31, 2005 (Courtesy NOAA)

4. The distribution of 3,325 ARGO drifters (buoys) in the world’s oceans at 0605 UTC on March 22, 2009—the data from these buoys are updated in almost real time from satellite observations. Each drifter collects data on temperature and salinity to 2000 m depth, and their movements indicate the direction and strength of ocean currents—important information for predicting weather. The ARGO project is a partnership of 44 countries. Viewing of the ARGO data is facilitated by a GIS viewer.

5. The launch of the International Society for Digital Earth in Beijing in May 2006 showing members of the Executive Committee. Professor Chen Shupeng, the father of GIS in China, is on the extreme left of the front row (see Dedication). (Provided by Secretary General Secretary of ISDE)

6. The status of the national partnerships committed to the Global Map in January 2009

7. A section of OpenStreetMap for (A) south Edinburgh, showing many paths and stairways, named buildings (e.g., the Institute of Geography), and other elements not shown on official mapping. (Map data © OpenStreetMap and contributors, CC-BY-SA) (B) shows an OpenStreetMap for Pyongyang in North Korea

8. Tabular summary of the state of SDI development in 32 countries in “greater ­Europe” in 2007 (Source: EC study summarized in sdi.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ws/Advanced_Regional_SDIs/arsdi_report.pdf)

9. The INSPIRE European Union Directive Web site

10. Milan Konecný (right) with the president of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus (second left), and the rector of Masaryk University (left). (Provided by Milan Konecný)

11. The U.S. federal government’s Geospatial One- Stop portal, which provides access to details of thousands of datasets

12. How place is seen at the heart of many UK government policies and is the rationale for the national Location Strategy (a type of SDI) (Source: Department of Communities and Local Government. Crown copyright)

13. Shoreh Elhami (Courtesy Shoreh Elhami)

14. A report from the New York Times of June 1, 2008, showing some of the results of mapping by GISCorps volunteers of the devastation after a cyclone struck Myanmar (Courtesy New York Times)