I posted last week on the ESRI campus map being the inverse of GIS and sent a trackback to the ESRI UC blog (I usually don’t send trackbacks) as a sort of test to see if ESRI would let it fly. Well it sure did and not only that it got a response.
Way cool!
Then I read the response. 🙁
The ESRI Virtual Tour was designed to be a simple drawing with interactive elements. We wanted it to be artistic, informative, and easy to use, and we felt that Flash was the appropriate tool for the job.
So by this definition, ESRI does not make any web-based mapping tools that are artistic, informative and easy to use. Heck of a conclusion, but basically that is what the ESRI UC blog is saying. Sometimes it is better think before writing something.
Really given those parameters, there is no reason that ArcWeb Services or ArcGIS Server couldn’t make beautiful maps that are easy to use. Someone needs to show the marketing team what people are doing with ESRI software. I’m actually flabbergasted that ESRI didn’t take this opportunity to use ArcWeb Explorer for such a tour. Of course another conclusion one could make is that the marketing team and the web team didn’t want to involve the ArcWeb or ArcGIS teams in such a project. You know, marketing knows better….
Yea well they were wrong on this. The whole point of such a tool is to show not only that the ESRI campus is a wonderful place to work, but ESRI actually uses the tools they create for their own benefit. Instead the result is the feeling that you can’t create beautiful maps with ESRI products and ESRI doesn’t believe in their own tools enough to use them.
