Spatialist Workshop

I attended the “Workshop on legal aspects of geographic data and spatial data infrastructure” on March 19, 2010. It was held at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Law and ICT (ICRI) at K.U. Leuven in Belgium. The workshop was attended by a number of lawyers and others interested in legal and policy issues from across Europe. Harlan Onsrud, who I am sure many of you know for his groundbreaking work in spatial law and policy matters - as well as his many other efforts, including Executive Director of the Global Spatial Data Infrastructure - was the other representative from the U.S. Katleen Janseen and the ICRI were wonderful hosts and the workshop was very informative due to the quality of both the presentations and the discussions that took place. I recommend that anyone interested in the legal and policy issues associated with spatial data infrastructures visit the Spatialist website (http://www.spatialist.be/) where the presentations will be posted, as well as keep an eye out for a book that will be published later this year. In addition, I believe ICRI is planning on hosting a similar event next year and I encourage those interested in this topic to put March 18, 2011 on their calendar.