Cartography merging virtual and real worlds

Ordnance Survey, Britain's national mapping agency, started 30 years ago to build a database of Britain's landscape and society. MasterMap contains 450m topographical features, each positioned to an accuracy of centimetres. They now believes that Augmented Reality would be a logical development of the database they made, it would provide useful geo-located information on the spot and in real time: overlaying map information on the real world could, for example, equip builders with "x-ray vision" to show the underground pipes and cables. Or it could give tourists a reconstructed view of archaeological ruins.

The mapping and position-finding technology is all there, what's still missing is a business model for supplying data to individuals - and a PDA with attributes, such as a screen that can be read in daylight.

All the details in The Guardian.
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From The Guardian Online.