"I think that people are concerned that the systems be used judiciously and wisely," said Elliot Pulham, senior vice president of the Space Foundation, a non-profit organization of space enthusiasts. "I know that Space Imaging has agreements in place with the national security community with the types of information it releases and who it releases it to.
"The last thing these guys want is to get cross-wise with the government," he said.
But a senior Space Imaging executive at the company's Denver-area headquarters said he did not know of any special agreement between Space Imaging and the federal government.
"We're not allowed to sell to a listing of various countries, to anyone in a terrorist country," said Brian Soliday, the company's vice president of North American sales and marketing. "That's a restriction that all U.S. companies must follow."
The company sells only to the end user, Soliday said, and does not track where the information goes after that.
"We have no way of knowing it," Soliday said, "I don't think anybody has."
Space Imaging is selling the images for $12 - $17 per square kilometer for North America with a minimum order of $1000, or $29 - $44 per square kilometer for regions outside of North America with a minimum order of $2000.
Prices outside North America are higher, a company spokesman said, in part because recovering information from the satellite is more difficult when it cannot transmit directly to the company's operations center in Colorado.
Customers can order images online or by phone. If Ikonos has already taken a picture of the area, the image is delivered within one or two days, said company spokeswoman Linda Lidov. Otherwise, customers have to wait for the satellite to pass over the target and take a picture.
Although the satellite passes around the Earth 14 times a day, Lidov said, customers have to wait for other, previously scheduled customers, and for the weather.
"There needs to be 20 percent or less cloud cover, and then we'll go ahead with it," she said.
Space Imaging is the first company to launch a remote sensing satellite of this ability. Its two chief competitors, EarthWatch and Orbimage, are planning to launch high-resolution craft later this year.
"All three of the major players feel like the potential is so great that all three can survive," said EarthWatch spokesman Chuck Herring. "All the companies aren't just looking at their two originals, but follow-on satellites as well."
Soliday said there were numerous uses for the images, including companies choosing a new building, small towns planning transportation upgrades, agricultural agencies studying the growth of weeds, and private land holders looking for a good, clear picture of what they have.
"I was just talking to some guys at a ranch in Colorado," Soliday said, "and they said, 'Hey, we got to call in some pictures of our ranch.' Because they just want to get a large overview of their landholdings."
"I think there will be some parallels to the Global Positioning System," Pulham said. "People are using GPS in ways no one expected. People are going to find some very novel ways to use this."
Soliday said he envisions a time when satellite pictures are used routinely in anything that needs visual information, such as real estate listings, insurance claims, or video games.
"You can go and get a [computer] game and fly around in a city," Soliday said. "In the future you'll be able to fly through and it won't be generated terrain, it will be real imagery laid over a terrain model."
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