2007.05.31

Smile, You’re on Google Maps!

On Tuesday Google unleashed a new feature on their Google Maps. It’s called Street View and allows you to zoom in to the level of the street and see what the outside of buildings look like and move about the streets of the city almost just like playing the old game Myst except without the puzzles. So far it looks like they’ve only got San Francisco, Las Vegas, Denver, New York City and Miami in the system but they have people driving their cameras around other cities taking pictures.

Unfortunately there are already complaints coming in of all the invasion of privacy issues. You can see people’s faces, license plates, and sometimes into their living rooms. Still, the pictures were taken on public streets and are, therefore, technically legal. Google has provided a means to report inappropriate views of people and/or buildings.

That being said a lot of people are having fun spotting strange photos (I found an odd one… teabagging?!?) and intrepid searchers have even found me loitering about txting a friend.

It’s an interesting project and I can’t wait to see what other people find…

8 Comments Categorized: geek   life   photos   rights   san francisco   technology

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8 Responses to “Smile, You’re on Google Maps!”

1. NHK says  (May 31st, 2007 at 15:18:09 )

   LOL! You iz txting in front of the kat!

2. douglas says  (May 31st, 2007 at 19:56:25 )

   “Hey! I c wut ur doin!”

   I guess I did open the door to some LOLcat comments…

3. Kevin says  (May 31st, 2007 at 21:21:38 )

   You can has message!

4. Uncle Roger says  (June 5th, 2007 at 14:18:23 )

   So, aren’t you even going to tell us where you are? Or do we have to go looking for you ourselves? Congrats!

5. NHK says  (June 5th, 2007 at 21:07:04 )

   Dugh iz at work hiding from gebrils.

6. douglas says  (June 5th, 2007 at 21:35:04 )

   I’d recommend looking fi you don’t already know. There should definitely be enough clues on the intertubes if you look about. If you find me (and I know you don’t know where the location is) then post the link!

7. Uncle Roger says  (June 6th, 2007 at 09:13:46 )

   You cannot hide! Found you!

8. douglas says  (August 25th, 2007 at 11:45:04 )

   Apparently Google is about to make it much, much easier for people to get their faces, license plates and other identifying factors removed from Google Streetview. Like this guy I just wish they would create an automated way of blurring faces and such…