The Elwood piece is less focused on geovisualization than the MacEachren and Kraak article. It suggested that in order to make data more global we should standardize the data. When discussing Kuhn’s piece Professor Sieber noted that much like German culture in general, that the data was extremely structured. Apparently the models designed by Kuhn run very well because the data is well structured.
That being said with the amount of data streaming in everyday it seems unfathomable to standardize everything. Elwood suggests that automated standardization is a possibility but this idea scares me. Imagine a world where you cannot control your own data. It seems that this reality is approaching everyday (with the recent blackout protest suggesting imminence). Schuurman also adds that automated data standardization may not be adequate due to dynamic data sets; individuals, constantly modifying data may be difficult to anticipate. What happens when data is changed and standardized? What happens when one parcel of data under a certain label is relabelled? Will a user be notified of the change? Or will the data be transported to another location?
Andrew GIS