OpenLitterMap-web now open source (Laravel + Vue)

It took a long while, but we have finally begun to release our codebase.

Following the release of openlittermap.com v2.0, we were to get ready for this release.

You can find our repo at github.com/openlittermap

OpenLitterMap

Soon, we will release

• OpenLitterMap-mobile (react native)
• OpenLitterAI (tensorflow.py and tensorflow.js)
• Littercoin smart contacts (solidity)
• OLM2QGIS integrations
• and more! Maybe you have some ideas?

A stretch of open data on litter, brands and plastic pollution in Wassenaar, The Netherlands https://openlittermap.com/world/The%20Netherlands/Zuid-Holland/Wassenaar/map

So far, OpenLitterMap has been almost entirely developed by 1 person. This was my first attempt at a web-app and it took some time to get ready to manage an open source project.

I had hoped to achieve a grant to work on it internally for a while to build up the skills and community to manage an open source project. But despite global pollution and unprecedented biodiversity extinction 64 grants have now rejected my proposal. I since got a job as a developer and I continue to work on OpenLitterMap part-time. Several people have been messaging me asking to help with the project and eventually after some bug fixes and removing hard-coded API keys in the source code to external .env files, we were ready to put the Open in OpenLitterMap.

OpenLitterMap is an open, interactive and accessible database of the world’s litter and plastic pollution. We believe that legal + scientific progress on pollution should be an open, transparent and democratic process that is not controlled, limited, or restricted by anyone or any group.

One important and overlooked principle of citizen science is that “the more polluted something is, the more open the data should be”. Otherwise, who will be allowed to produce knowledge, solutions and enforce rules about the state of global pollution?

There is a lot of work to do. Not only in the code, but in advancing geospatial and environmental literacy across the public, institutions and businesses. All around the world, 100s of millions of people have been equipped with devices that can collect really powerful data but we are not yet harnessing this unprecedented human potential.

There is now about 150m tonnes of plastic rotting in the ocean and this continues to increase every second. Litter destroys ecosystems, and costs us millions each year. This needs to be picked up, but if picking up is all we do, that is all we will ever do. There is a better way- it’s called empowering people to use their devices and share data. This is how we can actually stop the problem from happening in the first place.

If you would like to help, you can do so on github, or check out our first campaign video on this GoFundMe.

OpenLitterMap - A Revolutionary App to Map Litter, organized by Seán Lynch

We would also love to have you in our Slack channel

Thanks,

Seán