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The wayfinding feature highly contributed to the rise of cartographic platforms. However, no study really focused on the way these tools are both used and perceived in a wayfinding context. The qualitative investigation we conducted on 30 users of such platforms suggests that the related uses depend on – at least – two mental models: the first one assumes that the cartographic platform is a digital extension of paper maps, while the other one likens it to a GPS system.

Convergence of GIS with ICT (Internet, mobile phone) and geolocation systems (GPS) has now resulted in the emergence of a new form of Web- mapping based on techniques and principles of Web 2.0. Driven by information technologies, mapping traditionally reserved for professionals is now taking place in our daily practices. Beyond a marketing artifact, the « Web-mapping 2.0 » which allows the general public to read and write maps raises many questions about the (potential) place of amateurs into professional processes (updated databases, field collection, production of collaborative base maps, etc.). This article focuses on the acquisition of geographical knowledge through amateurs. More specifically, it explores the potential of Web-mapping 2.0 for citizen science, a term used to describe the involvement of citizens in the process of gathering scientific data.

For a few years now, several development projects have been carried out in municipal contexts in order to make spatial information available on the Internet. An overall observation of the existing municipal Web sites obviously shows the great variety of the objectives at stake, and of the technological solutions implemented. Despite the increasing number of researches dealing with the democratization of e-information addressed to citizens and e-governments, it is still difficult to clearly identify the current privileged means of communication between cities and citizens on the basis of cartographic data. This difficulty is related to the absence of formal and effective frameworks to characterize and classify the various ways to diffuse geospatial information on municipal Web sites. On the basis of the above, the present research aims at remedying this ignorance by elaborating a new classification framework to effectively describe GIS-based Web sites in municipal contexts. The adopted strategy consists in analysing the already existing partial approaches of classification, in order to pursue with the development of a more comprehensive pragmatic classification framework. This framework is then the subject of an experimentation consisting of a detailed analysis of the contents and functioning of a hundred existing municipal Web sites in Canada. Finally, this experimentation makes it possible to draw initial conclusions regarding the usability of the new classification mode proposed, as well as to identify some further research pathways.