Everytime I download a shapefile from the BLM, a state, county, or provence I think of the people that digitized so I don't have to, and I give thanks. What many don't realize is that the efforts of government employees, my tax dollars at work, trickle down in their own way. I don't have to make a topographic map because the USGS aleady has. That saves me time, which saves my clients money, which greases the gears of private concerns getting things done.

I'd have to dig up the study, but it is estimated that the investment in a single topographic map by the USGS results in several thousand times that in returns in the private sector.

(Thanks for the update on KK. Sounds like a good program for my community, so I'm very interested in your accounts.)