Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

A Conceptual Quality Framework for Volunteered Geographic Information

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Book cover Spatial Information Theory (COSIT 2015)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 9368))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

The assessment of the quality of volunteered geographic information (VGI) is cornerstone to understand the fitness for purpose of datasets in many application domains. While most analyses focus on geometric and positional quality, only sporadic attention has been devoted to the interpretation of the data, i.e., the communication process through which consumers try to reconstruct the meaning of information intended by its producers. Interpretability is a notoriously ephemeral, culturally rooted, and context-dependent property of the data that concerns the conceptual quality of the vocabularies, schemas, ontologies, and documentation used to describe and annotate the geographic features of interest. To operationalize conceptual quality in VGI, we propose a multi-faceted framework that includes accuracy, granularity, completeness, consistency, compliance, and richness, proposing proxy measures for each dimension. The application of the framework is illustrated in a case study on a European sample of OpenStreetMap, focused specifically on conceptual compliance.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    http://mcmcweb.er.usgs.gov/sdts.

  2. 2.

    http://www.iso.org.

  3. 3.

    http://goo.gl/W0rmVU.

  4. 4.

    http://wiki.openstreetmap.org.

  5. 5.

    http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Comparison_of_editors.

  6. 6.

    http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway.

References

  1. Ballatore, A.: Defacing the map: cartographic vandalism in the digital commons. Cartographic J. 51(3), 214–224 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Ballatore, A., Bertolotto, M.: Semantically enriching VGI in support of implicit feedback analysis. In: Tanaka, K., Fröhlich, P., Kim, K.S. (eds.) W2GIS 2011. LNCS, vol. 6574, pp. 78–93. Springer, Heidelberg (2010)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  3. Ballatore, A., Bertolotto, M., Wilson, D.: Computing the semantic similarity of geographic terms using volunteered lexical definitions. Int. J. Geograph. Inf. Sci. 27(10), 2099–2118 (2013a)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Ballatore, A., Wilson, D.C., Bertolotto, M.: A survey of volunteered open geo-knowledge bases in the semantic web. In: Pasi, G., Bordogna, G., Jain, L.C. (eds.) Quality Issues in the Management of Web Information. ISRL, vol. 50, pp. 93–120. Springer, Heidelberg (2013b)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  5. Barron, C., Neis, P., Zipf, A.: A comprehensive framework for intrinsic OpenStreetMap quality analysis. Trans. GIS 18(6), 877–895 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Batini, C., Scannapieco, M.: Data Quality: Concepts, Methodologies and Techniques. Springer, Berlin (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Bishr, M., Kuhn, W.: Trust and reputation models for quality assessment of human sensor observations. In: Tenbrink, T., Stell, J., Galton, A., Wood, Z. (eds.) COSIT 2013. LNCS, vol. 8116, pp. 53–73. Springer, Heidelberg (2013)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  8. Burton-Jones, A., Storey, V., Sugumaran, V., Ahluwalia, P.: A semiotic metrics suite for assessing the quality of ontologies. Data Knowl. Eng. 55(1), 84–102 (2005)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Si-said Cherfi, S., Akoka, J., Comyn-Wattiau, I.: Conceptual modeling quality - from EER to UML schemas evaluation. In: Spaccapietra, S., March, S.T., Kambayashi, Y. (eds.) ER 2002. LNCS, vol. 2503, pp. 414–428. Springer, Heidelberg (2002)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  10. Dodge, M., Kitchin, R.: Crowdsourced cartography: mapping experience and knowledge. Environ. Plan. A 45(1), 19–36 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Flanagin, A.J., Metzger, M.J.: The credibility of volunteered geographic information. GeoJournal 72(3–4), 137–148 (2008)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Frank, A.U.: Spatial communication with maps: defining the correctness of maps using a multi-agent simulation. In: Habel, C., Brauer, W., Freksa, C., Wender, K.F. (eds.) Spatial Cognition 2000. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1849, pp. 80–99. Springer, Heidelberg (2000)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  13. Goodchild, M.F., Gopal, S.: The Accuracy of Spatial Databases. CRC Press, Boca Raton (1989)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Goodchild, M.F., Li, L.: Assuring the quality of volunteered geographic information. Spat. Stat. 1, 110–120 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Guarino, N., Welty, C.A.: An overview of OntoClean. In: Staab, S., Studer, R. (eds.) Handbook on Ontologies, 2nd edn, pp. 201–220. Springer, Berlin (2009)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  16. Guarino, N., Oberle, D., Staab, S.: What is an ontology? In: Staab, S., Studer, R. (eds.) Handbook on Ontologies, 2nd edn, pp. 1–17. Springer, Berlin (2009)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  17. Guptill, S., Morrison, J. (eds.): Elements of Spatial Data Quality. Elsevier, Oxford (1995)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Haklay, M.: How good is volunteered geographical information? A comparative study of OpenStreetMap and ordnance survey datasets. Environ. Plan. B Plan. Des. 37, 682–703 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Haklay, M., Basiouka, S., Antoniou, V., Ather, A.: How many volunteers does it take to map an area well? The validity of Linus’ law to volunteered geographic information. Cartographic J. 47(4), 315–322 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Heipke, C.: Crowdsourcing geospatial data. ISPRS J. Photogrammetry Remote Sens. 65(6), 550–557 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Hunter, G., Bregt, A., Heuvelink, G., Bruin, S., Virrantaus, K.: Spatial data quality: problems and prospects. Research Trends in Geographic Information Science, LNGC, pp. 101–121. Springer, Berlin (2009)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  22. Kuhn, W.: Core concepts of spatial information for transdisciplinary research. Int. J. Geogr. Inf. Sc. 26(12), 2267–2276 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Mooney, P., Corcoran, P.: Characteristics of heavily edited objects in OpenStreetMap. Future Internet 4(1), 285–305 (2012a)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Mooney, P., Corcoran, P.: The annotation process in OpenStreetMap. Trans. GIS 16(4), 561–579 (2012b)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Rosch, E.: Principles of categorization. In: Margolis, E., Laurence, S. (eds.) Concepts: Core Readings, pp. 189–206. MIT Press, Cambridge (1999)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Salgé, F.: Semantic accuracy. In: Guptill, S., Morrison, J. (eds.) Elements of Spatial Data Quality, pp. 139–151. Elsevier, Oxford (1995)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  27. Shi, W., Fisher, P., Goodchild, M.F. (eds.): Spatial Data Quality. CRC Press, Boca Raton (2003)

    Google Scholar 

  28. Solskinnsbakk, G., Gulla, J.A., Haderlein, V., Myrseth, P., Cerrato, O.: Quality of hierarchies in ontologies and folksonomies. Data Knowl. Eng. 74, 13–25 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Stephens, M.: Gender and the GeoWeb: divisions in the production of user-generated cartographic information. GeoJournal 78(6), 981–996 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Tartir, S., Arpinar, I., Moore, M., Sheth, A., Aleman-Meza, B.: OntoQA: metric-based ontology quality analysis. In: IEEE Workshop on Knowledge Acquisition from Distributed, Autonomous, Semantically Heterogeneous Data and Knowledge Sources, at the 5th IEEE International Conference on Data Mining 2005, ICDM 2005, pp. 1–9. IEEE (2005)

    Google Scholar 

  31. Van Damme, C., Hepp, M., Coenen, T.: Quality metrics for tags of broad folksonomies. In: Proceedings of International Conference on Semantic Systems (I-SEMANTICS), Graz, Austria, pp. 118–125 (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  32. Veregin, H.: Data quality measurement and assessment. NCGIA Core Curriculum in Geographic Information Science (1998). http://www.ncgia.ucsb.edu/giscc/units/u100/u100_f.html

  33. Zielstra, D., Zipf, A.: A comparative study of proprietary geodata and volunteered geographic information for Germany. In: Painho, M., Santos, M.Y., Pundt, H. (eds.) Proceedings of the 13th AGILE International Conference on Geographic Information Science, pp. 1–15 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Sophie Crommelinck and Sarah Labusga (University of Heidelberg) for the implementation of the case study, and the OpenStreetMap community for supplying the data.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Spatial Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA

    Andrea Ballatore

  2. Geoinformatics Research Group, Department of Geography, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

    Alexander Zipf

Authors
  1. Andrea Ballatore
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Alexander Zipf
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Andrea Ballatore .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Sara Irina Fabrikant

  2. ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Martin Raubal

  3. School of Computer Science and Informatics, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Michela Bertolotto

  4. University of Winchester, Winchester, United Kingdom

    Clare Davies

  5. Dept. of Geography and Env. Studies, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

    Scott Freundschuh

  6. College of Arts and Science, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada

    Scott Bell

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this paper

Cite this paper

Ballatore, A., Zipf, A. (2015). A Conceptual Quality Framework for Volunteered Geographic Information. In: Fabrikant, S., Raubal, M., Bertolotto, M., Davies, C., Freundschuh, S., Bell, S. (eds) Spatial Information Theory. COSIT 2015. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 9368. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23374-1_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23374-1_5

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-23373-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-23374-1

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation