Contributions of GIScience over the Past Twenty Years

This paper summarizes the discussions related to the panel “Contributions of GIScientists (or GIScience) over the past Twenty Years” at the 2015 Vespucci Institute. Reflections about the past not only provide an account of what occurred, but also may serve as a basis for comparison when in the future somehow related scenarios arise. Such histories may be detailed enumerations of chronological events or, more analytically, analyses of interactions that enabled or caused specific developments. The purpose of this paper is to account for some key developments in the academic field of geographic information science over the past twenty years (i.e., since 1995) and to assess some of the impact of these developments. The panel in Bar Harbor, moderated by David Coleman, included two invited presentations (by Max Egenhofer and Keith Clarke), and responses by two early career panelists (Song Gao and Teriitutea Quesnot), and by two senior panelists (Randolph Franklin and May Yuan).