Mikel Maron
Bio
Mikel Maron initiated humanitarian mapping in OpenStreetMap in 2005 and co-founded the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team organization. He has served as President of the Board, and Chair of Voting Members. Mikel Maron currently leads the Community team at Mapbox, helping to grow the adoption of open geo data in humanitarian organizations, governments and education, and advancing work with OpenStreetMap. As Presidential Innovation Fellow at the US State Department Mikel drove OpenStreetMap adoption across federal agencies. He is co-founder of Map Kibera and GroundTruth Initiative and Board member of the OpenStreetMap Foundation. He holds a master’s degree in Evolutionary and Adaptive Systems from the University of Sussex, and bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from UC Santa Cruz.
Posts
HOT Board and Chair Elections
HOT Community, in a few hours, we will open nominations for Board and Chair elections! These are the key governance roles for HOT Voting...
HOTOSM recognized by the President of Mexico during Internet Day 2016
(Welcome and thank you Miriam Gonzalez for this guest post, sharing recognition by the President of Mexico of HOT during Hurricane Patricia! -Mikel) On "Internet Day",...
HOT Annual Meeting and Election Results
HOT Voting Members held their Annual General Meeting today, where we heard annual reports from HOT’s Executive Director, Board President, and Members Chair, and...
The Global Footprint of HOT
Guest post by Pratik Yadav, data analyst at Mapbox. The HOT Tasking Manager (TM) has been the critical tool for rapid and massive coordination...
White House Innovation for Disaster Response and Recovery Initiative Demo Day
You may have seen a few shout outs on twitter from last months disaster technology event at the White House. Albert Gembara’s talk is...
A new version of Tasking Manager
Last week we launched a new Version 2 update to the “Tasking Manager”. This popular tool created by H.O.T. allows people to view a...
Peace Corps + OpenStreetMap
The Peace Corps and Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team have been collaborating for over a year. To me its a natural connection. Peace Corps Volunteers (known...
Have Spare Holiday Time? Contribute with HOT Mapping
Many of us have spare quiet moments in the Christmas and New Year holiday season. We've gorged ourselves on food, cleaned up wripped apart wrapping paper, and maybe had a little time to relax and reflect. Now, If you're looking for something to occupy your time these days as your energy builds for the new year, you're more than welcome to join in and map HOT tasks, and make a solid contribution to places in humanitarian crisis right at this moment.
Comprehensive Report on Mali Activation
Early this year, HOT was activated in Mali. Pierre Beland took the lead on this activation, and produced for OCHA this excellent report. Recommended...
State Department Launches Imagery to the Crowd
The State Department Humanitarian Information Unit has launched Imagery to the Crowd![inline:Screen-Shot-2013-04-24-at-2.24.34-PM.png]This is important formal recognition of the partnership we've built over the past couple years. The premise is simple enough. HOT needs current aerial imagery to create up to date maps following a disaster event. The US government acquires that kind of imagery from commercial providers. Sharing the imagery with the OSM community means better maps for responders.
Hottie Humberto Yances presents the La Boquilla Project
Humberto Yances has written up his wonderful OSM community work in La Boquilla, and HOT wants to share great work by HOT members (note, this is not a formal HOT project). From an idea, to engagement, to mapping, to distribution, to use, La Boquilla clearly demonstrates what can happen with an open, networked, community based approach. [inline:equipo.jpg]From these evocative beginnings ...
Update from the Red Cross on Gulu and Lira
An update and thank you from Robert Banick at the American Red Cross on Gulu and Lira mapping
The first stage of the Red Cross's on-the-ground mapping exercises are wrapping up and I wanted to provide an update to all the incredible volunteers who got us this far.
[inline:2012-09-06 12.57.56 HDR.jpg]Your contributions to OSM were huge to us in Gulu, where we led a training on GIS basics for 12 Uganda Red Cross Society members. OSM in Gulu was used throughout to ground the course in real data: our GPS exercises were about collecting data for OSM and our mapping sessions made heavy use of the Gulu data. Uganda Red Cross staff were pretty delighted to see their contributions go right into the map. [inline:Gulu Fire Risk.png]
OpenStreetMap at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative Disaster Simulation
Last year I spent a bitterly cold day in a forest in Massachusetts, witnessing how people who have never experienced a disaster somehow prepare for taking part in a response. Instructive, frightening, and sometimes funny. Jennifer Chan has been bringing information tools into the process, with an Ushahidi instance last year. This year, there was the opportunity to bring OSM into the mix, and Christian Spanring, Kate Chapman, and myself helped to bring some maps together for the sim.
Wrapping up the Libyan Health Facility Activation
On January 14, we formally closed HOT's activation to help map health facilities in Libya.
This was definitely a new kind of activity for HOT. To start, we were directly by WHO to take part, and staff at the Tunis WMC office was incredibly active in the entire process.
Activation to Map Libyan Health Facilities
The World Health Organization (WHO) has asked HOT and the Stand By Task Force (SBTF) to activate to map health facilities in in Libya....
The Amazing OSM Community, and the Tasking Server, Maps Swaziland
One month ago, I asked what to do with 10 million GPS points, and it turns out one awesome answer is map an entire...
Activation in Somalia
HOT has activated to improve OSM, for the drought and famine crisis in East Africa. Read on for the background, the actions we're taking,...
Haiti OSM Mapping for Japan and Libya
The COSMHA team came in for a training today on aerial imagery tracing and some review of fundamentals. Despite the initial remote Haiti OSM...
An Midday Hour of Mapping on LogBase in Port au Prince
Erica and I have been in Haiti for almost a week. Inspiring and overwhelming, and lots to talk about. But for this moment, just...
Tufts Crisis Mapping Class
The Tufts University Crisis Mapping Class is surveying the tools, ideas, and networks in new approaches to crisis response. There was a class on...
Please join! HOT conference call, February 16 12pm EST
Hello all, It's been an amazing year for OpenStreetMap and the H.O.T. community. We've supported humanitarian efforts and built capacities on every continent. Starting...
How to improve our work in Haiti? MapMaker and OSM thoughts too by Mikel
This is a question I'm considering a lot "¦ filtered through the brief rushes of reading the amazing crisismappers list, diving into OSM on...
Haiti, Mission 2 by Mikel
Nicolas Chavent and Dane Springmeyer are now on Haitian soil for HOT. It was just a few weeks ago that Nicolas and Robert returned...
Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team Deploying to Haiti by Mikel
This weekend, Nicolas Chavent and Robert Soden will deploy to Haiti for the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team. MapAction and OCHA are facilitating this mission, with...
HOT List by Mikel
The Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team now has a mailing list. During crisis, the HOT list supports coordination among the OSM community, along side appropriate local...
Humanitarian OSM Team: Haiti Strategy and Proposal
Who, what, where, and how are all open questions. Why is simple "¦ OpenStreetMap has demonstrated incredible value in Haiti and we need to...
