Why Hivemapper?

This is an overview of features offered by Hivemapper that make it a compelling network for building a global map from every perspective. This overview is intended for people familiar with the geospatial industry, decentralization, mapping technologies, or crowdsourced systems.
A useful blockchain
The Hivemapper Blockchain will incentivize the creation of a decentralized mapping network, and reward contributors (map miners) with $HONY, the token of the Hivemapper Blockchain.  The Hivemapper Blockchain will verify that each tile provided map coverage, establishing and storing the truth about the physical world at that location on the blockchain.  The Hivemapper Blockchain is not currently live.
Open market
Anybody can join the Hivemapper Network and begin mapping without needing permission.  Contributing to the map only requires a smartphone to begin with, or you can graduate to mapping with a dashcam or drone as well.  By lowering the barriers to entry for contributing to a map and rewarding contributors, Hivemapper is building not just a new global map, but a new mapping economy.
Anonymous and unbiased
Today, governments and land owners often influence (or worse yet dictate) what gets mapped and to what resolution it's mapped.  By providing an anonymous mapping network, contributors can safely provide map coverage and users can be confident that the map is unbiased and reflects the true physical ground truth.
Hivemapper seeks to establish the single source of truth about our physical world
Reliable maps
Because the Hivemapper Network rewards contributors there is an ongoing economic reason for contributors to continue to participate, and produce high quality map coverage. Additionally, the network incentivizes contributors to map in the places that matter most to customers consuming the maps.
Every perspective
Satellites and airborne are fantastic top-down perspectives but they simply cannot see what a dashcam sees at street level. Hivemapper supports multiple modes of collection (airborne and ground level) and consumes multiple types of content (imagery, video, and location telemetry).  This enables Hivemapper to grow a global map that helps users see more of the earth and see objects from the air and ground perspectives.
Localized
If you are unhappy with the maps in your area, you can easily participate in mapping them.   You don't need to wait until some large company decides to prioritize your neighborhood or city for mapping.
Competitive prices
Prices for Hivemapper APIs are competitive as the Hivemapper Network's approach leverages low cost commodity hardware from contributors who operate from their local cities and neighborhoods. 
Networked, not crowdsourced
Hivemapper combines many elements of other successful crowdsourced mapping and decentralized systems. What makes Hivemapper unique is that unlike most crowdsourced mapping systems it is a mapping network with key differences:
​
Category
Mapping network
Crowdsourced map
Economic incentives
Built-in
None
Coverage
Network incents coverage where it matters
Uneven coverage
Collection tools
Collection software and hardware tools connected directly to the map, so collection knows what the maps needs
Collection tools are disconnected from the map itself, so map often gets redundant information
Anonymous
Built in anonymity for contributors
At the contributor's discretion
​
Puts walk and drive time to use
Hivemapper puts your time to additional use by enabling one to collect for a global map while you walk or drive.  Contributors can easily map with their smartphone or dashcam, and contributors are motivated to join Hivemapper to earn rewards.
Contributing to the map with a drone requires some human supervision. We expect that to change in the near future.
Reputation, not marketing
In the Hivemapper Network, contributors demonstrate their reliability against a transparent set of tile attribution criteria that determines the quality and authenticity of the content.  
Open source
The code that runs contributor collection tools, map processing, and map storage and rendering will be made open source.  Contributors don't need to write their own code to enable collection, the code that determines how rewards are distributed is open and transparent to all, and users can inspect the algorithms that produce the global map.  Everyone benefits from improvements made to Hivemapper's code, and we would love it if you decided to help build the new mapping economy.
​
​Join Us.
​
​

Resources - Previous

Terminology

Next - Building Hivemapper

Get Involved

Last modified 3mo ago

Export as PDF

Copy link

Contents

A useful blockchain

Open market

Anonymous and unbiased

Networked, not crowdsourced

Puts walk and drive time to use

Reputation, not marketing

Open source