If you've been using Ride the City for a while, you probably noticed that we changed our base map a couple of weeks ago.

When we developed the second generation of Ride the City we decided to take a chance on using map data and technology from OpenStreetMap (OSM) and CloudMade.

OpenStreetMap is (in their own words) a "free editable map of the whole world." It gives us (and you) the ability to add points of interest, fix street lines, add the location of bike lanes and other bicycle infrastructure and generally improve the maps for everybody who uses OSM – not just users of Ride the City.

CloudMade was launched last year to provide technology and services that make OpenStreetMap data more useful to developers and users. For example, their technology allows us to style the maps we show on Ride the City, pushing highways and other non-essential features into the background. They also sponsor the development of Web Maps Lite, a javascript engine for displaying their maps, drawing route lines, markers, etc.

We'd like to shout out to CloudMade for their great looking maps. With a special thanks to Russ Nelson for joining us at our Ride the City 2.0 launch party last month -- and to Vladimir Agafonkin, the tireless lead developer of Web Maps Lite who quickly answered all of our questions while we were in frenzied development mode.

Finally, know that you can become a part of the OSM community. Whether you're a map geek or just interested in helping to improve their maps' accuracy in your neighborhood, join the community by signing up. Your input will improve Ride the City's maps and the maps of OSM users all over the world.