The Geospatial Web will have a profound impact on managing knowledge, structuring workflows within and across organizations, and communicating with like-minded individuals in virtual communities. The enabling technologies for the Geospatial Web are geo-browsers such as NASA World Wind, Google Earth and Microsoft Live Local 3D. These three-dimensional platforms revolutionize the production and consumption of media products. They not only reveal the geographic distribution of Web resources and services, but also bring together people of similar interests, browsing behavior, or geographic location.

This book summarizes the latest research on the Geospatial Weba (TM)s technical foundations, describes information services and collaborative tools built on top of geo-browsers, and investigates the environmental, social and economic impacts of geospatial applications. The role of contextual knowledge in shaping the emerging network society deserves particular attention. By integrating geospatial and semantic technology, such contextual knowledge can be extracted automatically a" for example, when processing Web documents to identify relevant content for customized news services.

Presenting 25 chapters from renowned international experts, this edited volume will be invaluable to scientists, students, practitioners, and all those interested in the emerging field of geospatial Web technology. Updates and additional resources are available at www.geospatialweb.com.

Foreword by Patrick J. Hogan, Program Manager of NASA World Wind.

This book brings together artieies exploring the design, implementation, man agement, funding, promotion, and evaluation of networked information systems that advocate sustainability and the protection of natural ecosystems. Case stud ies of deployed and planned information systems complement theoretieal work on the methodologieal, technologieal, and organizational foundations of envi ronmental online communieation. Studying communieative strategies and processes that function between disci plines and worldviews, this book helps unearth hidden assumptions and miscon ceptions about environmental issues, contributes to a mutual understanding of existing problems, and suggests priorities for research and policy development. The 25 chapters contained in this volume analyze environmental online commu nieation from four interrelated perspectives: Raising Environmental Awareness, Environmental Science, Corporate Sustainability, and Networks and Virtual Communities. The chapters document social and technologieal challenges and allow readers to appreciate the diversity of approaches and projects. The initiative to compile this edited volume sterns from the activities of the ECOresearch Network 696], an interdisciplinary collaboration that encourages scientific discourse and critieal debate to establish a shared understanding of en vironmental online communieation. The network also hosts the book's official Web site at www.ecoresearch.net/springer 701], whieh provides supplemental material induding text sampies, bibliographie resources, project descriptions, and detailed author profiles induding current affiliations and research interests."

This book brings together artieies exploring the design, implementation, man agement, funding, promotion, and evaluation of networked information systems that advocate sustainability and the protection of natural ecosystems. Case stud ies of deployed and planned information systems complement theoretieal work on the methodologieal, technologieal, and organizational foundations of envi ronmental online communieation. Studying communieative strategies and processes that function between disci plines and worldviews, this book helps unearth hidden assumptions and miscon ceptions about environmental issues, contributes to a mutual understanding of existing problems, and suggests priorities for research and policy development. The 25 chapters contained in this volume analyze environmental online commu nieation from four interrelated perspectives: Raising Environmental Awareness, Environmental Science, Corporate Sustainability, and Networks and Virtual Communities. The chapters document social and technologieal challenges and allow readers to appreciate the diversity of approaches and projects. The initiative to compile this edited volume sterns from the activities of the ECOresearch Network 696], an interdisciplinary collaboration that encourages scientific discourse and critieal debate to establish a shared understanding of en vironmental online communieation. The network also hosts the book's official Web site at www.ecoresearch.net/springer 701], whieh provides supplemental material induding text sampies, bibliographie resources, project descriptions, and detailed author profiles induding current affiliations and research interests."

This volume emphasizes the applications and implications of the Geospatial Web and the role of contextual knowledge in shaping the emerging network society. There is a clear focus on applied geospatial aspects. The book has contributions from a very active research community. Containing chapters from renowned researchers and practitioners, this volume will be invaluable to all interested in this field.

Evolutionary Web Development examines the evolution of Web information systems, paying particular attention to the emergent attributes of electronic markets. It identifies four categories of architecture and demonstrates their virtues and limitations: static, interactive, adaptive, and agent-mediated systems.Advanced systems require the developer to truly understand the needs and preferences of customers. As well as such personal attributes, the availability of empirical data about the structure and content of Web information systems is a precondition for their effective assessment. Arno Scharl presents an automated and scalable approach to Web assessment. He emphasizes the role of feedback in an iterative cycle of design, implementation, usage, and analysis.