A new project by Teehan+Lax, the Toronto-based design firm that helped created Ev Williams’ Medium publishing platform, builds on its previous work with Hyperlapse to provide a way to navigate Google Street View with just a wave of your hand. The experiment uses the same engine as Hyperlapse, and takes advantage of an early developer-seeded Leap Motion controller unit to give a user a very cool… → Read More
Google Street View is maybe one of the most interesting and under appreciated technical developments of the past decade, but it’s all a little static when viewed through standard channels like Google Maps on the desktop or on a mobile device. A new project from Toronto UX design firm Teehan+Lax, which operates a Labs unit to explore its more playful side, threads together Street View imagery to… → Read More
Two years after the devastating Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, Google has launched Street View images of Namie-machi in the Fukushima exclusion zone. The area encompasses Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Plant, which after the disaster was the scene of the largest nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. The 360-degree panoramic imagery, showing ruined buildings on empty streets, is both eerie and… → Read More
Earlier today Google released the full report of the FCC’s investigation into the collection of “payload data” from open Wi-Fi networks — aka passwords, email and search history from open networks — that its fleet of Street View cars obtained between 2008 and April 2010. An earlier and heavily redacted version of the report was released on April 15 but today’s version only redacted the names… → Read More
Have you started seeing images in online reCAPTCHAs that look suspiciously like house numbers pulled from Google Street View? Well, as it turns out, that’s exactly what they are. Google confirmed it’s currently running an experiment that involves using its reCAPTCHA spam-fighting system to improve data in Google Maps by having users identify things like street names and business addresses. → Read More
Back in October, we came across a mysterious site called Google Demo Slam a couple days before it actually launched. It turned out to be a fun site featuring demos of different Google products where you can watch two demos side by side and vote for the best one.
Some of the demos are by Google engineers, but anyone can submit their own and vie to become a Google Demo Slam champ. Below are a few… → Read More
Since 2007 Google Street View, in an effort to “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful” has visually captured the human experience gamut from pranks, to nudity, to crimes to death. While it’s had its share of issues, the Google Maps project is perhaps one of the greatest juxtapositions of technology and imagery our culture has produced. → Read More
If Google Street View and Chatroulette mated and gave birth to a lovechild, it’d look a lot like MapCrunch. For the record, this is not a TechCrunch network site, and would have probably been better off with a name like MapRoulette or StreetviewRoulette or something.
Either way, if you want to be taken to a random location on Google Street View (in North America, Europe, Asia or Australasia)… → Read More
Brazil, which already has a relatively high proportion of Google data removal requests, is experiencing some stumbles relating to yesterday’s launch of Google Street view, including the discovery of not one but two images of dead bodies, specifically the photo to the left snapped at Avenida Presidente Vargas in Rio De Janeiro and another one reportedly captured at Belo Horizonte, Minas… → Read More
In the game or Risk, the main objective is to take control over every land mass on the planet. With an update to Street View today, Google has just completed that.
The original idea behind Google Street View was a good one: give everyone in the world a view from any street in the world. Of course, when it launched in May 2007, Street View was only available in five cities in the U.S. But the… → Read More
Google cannot contain its legal problems surrounding the inadvertent collection of personal data from WiFi networks by ots global fleet of Street View cars. Earlier today, police in South Korea raided Google’s offices there to confiscate computers storing data collected from Street View cars in that country. This action follows similar investigations in France, Germany, the UK (where Google was… → Read More
Last week, the newly renamed Google Places added a ton of features to help local businesses create a directory page right on Google. Today, Google’s Street View is joining the party by showing links to local business listings right in Street View. As you turn around in Street View, names of local businesses and other “Google Places” will show up overlayed on top of buildings. As you hover over… → Read More
There’s never a shortage of controversy surrounding Google Street View. Even if you think the service is useful and/or cool to look at, you have to admit there’s something creepy about Google cars driving around countries collecting these data with cameras mounted on the roof. And it appears that someone in Germany had just about enough of that.
Police are investigating an incident in Oldenburg… → Read More
Local search is heating up, especially on advanced mobile phones, where augmented reality apps and immersive photo-realistic apps show great promise. EveryScape, a startup in Waltham Massachusetts which has built out immersive 3D photoscapes for 20 cities, raised a $6 million Series C funding. The investment was led led by SK Telecom Americas, a subsidiary of the Korean telecom giant, which will… → Read More
This makes me sad inside. Pranksters really didn’t tag a Google Street View car with a GPS sensor and track it around Berlin. Nope, it was all just an Internet prank by a bunch of hipster art students. I guess this explains the non-systemic driving pattern though. Anyway, Google’s statement is after the jump along with one of the videos showing the fake car in action. → Read More
Google’s Street View has gone to many strange places, even off-road. But in preparation for the Winter Olympics it equipped a snowmobile with 360-degree cameras and took it to the top of Whistler, the Canadian ski resort where the Games will take place.
The slope-side views can be seen in the map on Google’s new Winter Olympics information page. Google should do this for all major ski… → Read More
At Google I/O this year, one demo booth stood out above all others: The Holodeck. It was basically eight giant, long screens arranged in a circle that displayed Google Street View imagery. When you stepped into the contraption, it was a bit like zooming around outside. Today, Google has taken the time to explain the project a bit, which it now calls “Liquid Galaxy.”
Apparently, the reason for the… → Read More
We’ve heard of people getting upset when their picture shows up on Google Street View (the street-level picture you can zoom into from Google Maps). For this reason, Google blurs out people’s faces for privacy. Others have protested Google coming down their street to photograph their house (cough, Paul McCartney). But can Google Street View also be used as a marketing vehicle?
Nate Heagy… → Read More
I’m of the opinion that if you write a song like “Yesterday” you can do whatever you want. That’s why (well, partially why) I’m not upset at Sir Paul McCartney, who is having a bit of a hissy fit vis-à-vis Google Street View. McCartney recently asked this his house be removed from Street View because, as a spokesman put it, he felt “unsettled” that people could look at his house 24 hours… → Read More
http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1683367&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1 Tokyo Jogging is the name of a cool idea Ryo Katsuma, a renowned Japanese software engineer, single-handedly turned into reality in his spare time. Katsuma-san’s project is a mashup of Wii technology and Google Street View. Users can… → Read More
Everyone loves a good Wii Fit hack. This guy hooked up his Wii Fit to Google’s street view so he could walk around town. It’s kind of neat idea, but I really don’t know how fun it is to march in place. I rather just sit in my chair and click a mouse. via Makezine Blog → Read More
Not the UK The United Kingdom, home to some 4.23 million CCTV cameras, has a problem with Google Street View. It seems that a busybody privacy rights organization, Privacy International, objects to Google’s commercial use of photos that include people. For-profit photos should have the express written consent of the people in them, it argues. Not unreasonable if you can clearly identify the… → Read More
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