Several years ago I attended a gathering of satellite industry professionals hosted by MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates in Richmond, BC.  In his opening remarks, company co-founder Dr. John MacDonald wanted us to understand the ramifications of what he termed the “data-information gap”which be believed limited the commercial viability of satellite remote sensing.  He asserted that satellite systems were “technology-pushed” rather than “user-pulled.”  He meant that new spaceborne systems had evolved primarily as a result of the interest in technology development rather than any sufficient demand from an end-user market.

Building, launching, and operating spacecraft is extraordinarily expensive.  (For example, the new GEOEYE spacecraft reportedly cost over $500 million to get up.)  Despite analysts’ long-held predictions of a burgeoning market for space-based imagery and other data sets, at the time of the gathering in Richmond, commercial ventures like Space Imaging had been struggling to make ends meet.  The missing end-users, in Dr. MacDonald’s view, were largely decision-makers; i.e., executives and senior authorities, not scientists or GIS specialists.  They had the necessary influence to make capital available for commercial space ventures of this sort.  Existing satellite systems could produce terabytes of data each day, yet there were few, if any, tools to turn this data into information useful to decision-makers.  This was the root of Dr. MacDonald’s data-information gap.  Until the gap was narrowed considerably, commercial remote sensing from space would remain economically unviable.

The gap may indeed be narrowing.  These are exciting times in the business.  Secret government agencies are no longer the sole keepers of the domain. God bless Google Earth.  If any one development of late has brought satellite remote sensing to the common person’s desktop, this has.  I even know a fur trapper using satellite weather and photos to plan his adventures in the Alaskan bush.  News organizations have been using satellite imagery regularly for several years.  Humanitarian and emergency management organizations have become much more sophisticated consumers for planning and responses.  Firefighters use products from NOAA, NASA, and USGS satellites to coordinate their efforts.  Epidemiologists can predict disease outbreaks and spread with satellite-derived products.  Community planners and developers frequently support their zoning work and business decisions using photos from space.   Satellite remote sensing is even a way for ordinary citizens to keep governments honest.  UCLA researchers recently published an [1] interesting analysis using Air Force weather satellite data to conclude the troop surge in Iraq may not have contributed as much to the decrease in violence in Baghdad as ethnic cleansing of neighborhoods had done.

The gap is narrowing, but it’s far from gone.  Many advancements are in the pipeline, and the evolution is bound to be quite dramatic.  As an analog, consider the Global Positioning System.  Not so long ago it was confined to military and government use, and now GPS technology is nearly ubiquitous.  Chances are good that you even carry it around every day with a cellular phone in your pocket.

We are all part of the revolution.  (Isn’t it cool to be a revolutionary?)  I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!