Geoscience Information Services (GIS) is a sole proprietorship that was established in Reston, Virginia, in 1983. In 1992, operations were transferred to West Falmouth, Cape Cod, Massachusetts; in 2017, operations were transferred to Charlottesville, Virginia. The two permanent staff members are Richard S. Williams, Jr., Ph.D., Director-Science, and Mary Ellen Williams, M.A., Director-Education. GIS also has an affiliated contract staff who work on special assignments as needed, such as desktop publishing (book design, page formatting, computer graphics, and printing), and supporting the GIS publications imprint, Cape Cod Geographic^®. The primary mission of GIS is to improve the public understanding of Earth System Science* through both print and digital media, including the Internet.

Services: In addition to selling books, booklets, and other printed products under the Cape Cod Geographic^TM imprint, GIS also distributes two scientific DVDs in North America about the 1963-1967 eruption of Surtsey volcano, Vestmannaejar, Iceland. GIS provides lectures on a wide variety of scientific topics about the Earth System, prepares original and secondary access to educational materials, does original writing on a scientific topics, provides technical review services, markets a variety of digital images, and refers website visitors to other URLs (e.g., NASA, USGS, etc.) that host images documenting the Earth System and changes to it, and publishes books, booklets, Earth System Fact Sheets, and other printed products.

*Earth System Science: Earth System Science is a science that considers Planet Earth as a holistic system, in which changes in the Geosphere [Lithosphere (solid Earth), Hydrosphere (liquid water), Cryosphere (frozen water), and Atmosphere], the Biosphere (all lifeforms), climatic processes, hydrologic cycle, and biogeochemical cycles can cause changes in one or more others. Global environmental change, climate change, human impact on the planet are all aspects of the science; thousands of scientists from virtually all of the nations of the world are involved in studies of past, present, and projected future changes in the Earth System. A visit to the Lecturing part of the GIS website provides a good overview of Earth System Science topics that have been previously addressed by GIS.