Thursday, April 12, 2012

On the horizon

I was in Kansas City Monday and Tuesday meeting with a group of police and public safety managers who were invited to see some of the best emerging software technology for geospatial analysis.  Some pretty amazing developments have taken place in recent months.  I was particularly impressed by a product from Azavea, HunchLab, which uses science-based statistical analysis to anticipate such phenomenon as crime hot spots, burglary risk, and future service demands.

I believe Azavea and the Omega Group are doing some work together, and I foresee that this could result in some good things being incorporated into the CrimeView products LPD uses so effectively.  I also got to see some of the new features coming in the next release of CrimeView Dashboard, one of which, Spatial Notes, really caught my eye. It's similar in concept to the location-aware bulletins we are implementing in NearMe (the application formerly known as P3i).

1 comment:

Dr. Finch said...

HunchLab reminds me a bit of the "Machine" on the CBS Person of Interest TV show.

The technology on that program is even less believable than the ridiculous nonsense on CSI. But the basic premise of analyzing nearly everything looking for patterns to trigger a hunch may be nearing reality.

Technology is inherently amoral.

It will take us a while to work out the ethical issue involved. I hope people who live up to the values you profess have more influence than the hacks everywhere who would love to see the establishment of an American Stazi or Mukhabarat.