Qwhery’s Co-Founder, Matt Pietryszyn, sat down with Daniel O’Donohue on his podcast MapScaping, “a podcast for the geospatial community”.
MapScaping
Daniel and Nina O’Donohue started MapScaping in 2018, originally made to be a place to showcase and sell their created minimalist maps based on elevation data. As their following grew, they shifted focus to educating others about how maps are made.
In 2019, they published their first episode of The MapScaping Podcast, and since then, have been able to introduce thousands of listeners to new ideas and innovations in the geospatial world.
A Voice Interface for Geospatial Data
During our conversation with O’Donohue, we got to discuss the increasing overall presence of voice technology in everyday settings, and what that means for voice systems, such as Qwhery. With over one-third of Americans now owning a smart speaker, it is essential that innovators look at giving the people what they want and need, a smart device compatible tool that provides answers to their spatial questions.
The conversation continued to cover topics such as how voice skills and actions work, leading to our initiatives, with one example being our work with Q11 and focus on adding geographical questions such as “when is garbage day?” to the smart devices’ vocabulary, and the details of the technical processes that come with it.
We wrapped up the podcast by reflecting on the future of spatial voice querying. While voice assistants and artificial intelligence have come a long way in a short amount of time, there is still more to cover.
It was a pleasure speaking with Daniel about the growing presence and usage of voice systems and sharing how Qwhery’s collaborations with municipalities can lead to an improvement in community engagement. Thank you, MapScaping, for having us!
Listen to the podcast now on all major podcast networks including Apple, Google, and Spotify, or check it out below.