<Former CEO of Talisman Energy: Peak oil is 'here or hereabouts' The Oil Drum DrumBeat: February 1, 2008>

55 comments on Satellite O'er the Desert

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meganerd on February 1, 2008 - 7:54am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

If you know where to get updated high-res images of that area, then I can forward it on to my former colleagues and they'll get it included. However, I suspect the problem is that whoever it was that took the higher-res images wants to charge Google an arm and a leg to license it. Unfortunately a lot of areas in the world don't bring in enough advertising dollars from local search to justify the expense of acquiring better pictures.

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JoulesBurn on February 1, 2008 - 8:57am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Every last acre of Ghawar is covered in one or more 2006-2007 images from DigitalGlobe, the best out there. I'm convinced that someone is paying DG to take these shots. Why some of them are not being used (2006 Shedgum and Haradh images) is beyond me. A 2006 high-res shot of a small, isolated, but interesting (from an oil standpoint) area of Uthmaniyah was suddenly included a year after it was taken. There is also a 2007 DG image covering an area just south of there that I would like to have.

I would imagine that Google Earth has license to all of DigitalGlobe existing imagery such that they don't pay by the piece. If an image exists (e.g., someone paid for the photoshoot), the bottleneck is GE taking the time to correct for azimuth skew and put it in the right location. I don't think the decision to do that for a particular area is random, either.

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55 comments on Satellite O'er the Desert

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