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Technologies of Mapping: Geographic Information Systems
Maps existed, of course. . . . they were maps that were drawn by hand and every time a minor change occurred they had to be redone by hand, a tediously slow process (Rundles 1992, 41).
Geographical information systems (GISs) are essential components in the electronic mapping of information. This powerful desk- top computer software introduces a degree of reflexibility to the maintenance and updating of consumer databases. The term GIS, however, has historically referred to varying modes or models of spatial analysis rather than to any one particular computer program or product. John Pickles (1995, 3), for instance, argues that GIS has at one time or another been used to refer to or describe a field of interdisciplinary researchers; a particular ‘‘community’’; ‘‘an approach to geographic inquiry and spatial data handling; a series of technologies for collecting, manipulating, and representing spatial information; a way of thinking about spatial data; a commodified object that has monetary potential and value; and a technical tool that has strategic value.’’
Land-based GIS, operationalized in the maintenance, modification, and diagnosis of personal information, however, dates back to the early 1970s resource management in Colorado. As a pioneer in geodemographic mapping, the state’s leading utility officer, Delwin D. Hock, has been widely acknowledged as a pioneer in the field of GIS. Hock offers the reasoning behind his efforts to diagnose geographic data (Parent & Konty 1992, 20):
All the [computer] emphasis had been on accounting and billing. . . . But I thought, How do we better utilize the excess capacity? Geography is a very important part of our business. . . . Every facility and customer has a unique geographical location. I thought, How do we create a computer model of that system?
The chair realized his goal of a geographical information program by joining geographic and spatial information where his customers were located in relation to the company’s services.Although GIS technologies were largely relegated to large corporations and government agencies in the 1980 and early 1990s, their ability to cross-reference past patterns to prescribe or simulate future relationships—facilitated by an increase in speed, accuracy, and depth in ‘‘mappable’’ information, drastically decreased consumer prices, and widespread personal computer compatibility— has benefitted a range of activities in both the marketplace and the civic arena. In mapping or visualizing ‘‘what-if ’’ scenarios, for example, campaigns could pretest products, services, campaign slogans, promotions, and advertisements on present and future geographic communities. In this capacity, GIS can be viewed as ‘‘simulational as well as representational’’ (Goss 1995, 182).
