Lunar Street View

Google's not just going for Street View's of the enitre Earth, Lunar Street View coverage isn't too far away.

On Google Moon, there are many placemarks available in the Apollo layer, including Street View for a few locations:

Apollo 11: Placemark 10

Apollo 12: Pacemark 6

Apollo 14: Placemark 10

Apollo 15: Placemark 3

Apollo 16: Placemark 8

Apollo 17: Placemark 5

Okay, it's not technically a Street View, but it works much like the Street View here on Earth. You can pan, zoom in and out, and there's an astronaut similar to Street View Guy.

What's next? Well, possibly a way to link to these like on Google Maps, and hopefully these panoramas on Google Moon API. Hey, it's one small step for a man, right?

RealEstate.com Wins a Hermes Award

RealEstate.com added Google Street View to its website three weeks ago, and today, it's won a 2008 Hermes Creative Award for its website. Congratulations, RealEstate.com!

New Street View in Manhattan

As reported in the Google Latlong blog, Street View for Manhattan, New York, is updated today, with higher resolution, views going to the sky and ground (to see the tops of skyscrapers from their bases will be convenient), and the introduction of Street View's new face-blurring feature, still in beta, but still very useful.

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Check out Manhattan on Street View to see these great new features!

Scappare! Street View è venuta!

http://timesonline.typepad.com/technology/2008/05/when-google-ear.html

In Roma, it seems that the Google Street View Astra is like a monster or something, because as the car was driving through the city, Romans went running away from it. When Roma is available in Street View, check out Viale di Trastevere, the street where Bernhard Warner saw these Romans in action.

Brought to You by the Saturn Astra

For the European Street View sightings, it appears that Google is using the Saturn Astra for driving around. They used a big van for the first cities in the United States, then a Chevrolet Cobalt, and now the Saturn Astra joins the club.

Another Reason to Take Your Own Bag

Well, it appears that all these plastic shopping bags are wasteful, and now they're getting just plain annoying. Check this out:


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For over half a mile of College Road in Fairbanks, Alaska, south of the Bentley Mall, a plastic shopping bag flying in the air landed on the Google Street View camera until the driver had to pull over to get it off.

More Street View Cities Anyday Now

As you can see, the prediction on the right falls on today, and there aren't any new Street View cities yet. What happened with the previous prediction, March 26, is that more Street View cities came out the day after, so the prediction was quite close.

If things go properly, you should expect more Street View as soon as tomorrow!

L'automobile à Paris

Yesterday, Saturday, May 3, 2008, a Street View car was found in Paris, with the 3D lasers on top, as found by Géographie 2.0.

[picture removed]

See the Google logo on the side there with Street View Guy? This adds France to the list of upcoming Street View countries.
So far the list is:

1. Australia
2. New Zealand
3. Italy
4. France
5. United Kingdom
6. Japan

O l'excitation!

So Much Coverage, So Few Icons

There are some complaints about over 400 cities available in Street View, and only 43 camera icons being shown in Google Maps. In Google Earth, this problem has been solved by adding more icons as you zoom in, but not on Google Maps.

Using only some icons in Google Maps does give the viewer an idea about where Street View is available, so that's a plus. Also, because Google is trying to provide Street View for the whole world, the icons will eventually disappear. The current icons would get very cluttered on Google Maps if they were for all of the 400+ cities available, so it appears Google's solution works out quite well.

One thing that might also work well is to highlight the Street View areas in blue instead of placing camera icons for the main city in that region.

I CAN Believe It's Not in Street View

Vox Populi author Sam Sweeney is surprised that Detroit, MI, came before Washington, DC, in Street View. He writes a blog for the Georgetown Voice, and is disappointed that the capital of the United States has been delayed for Street View release. Washington is one city that, because of its high security, does not surprise. Here is a list of other cities that obviously will be delayed for a while:

• Grand Canyon, Arizona - Although it's a wonderful national park, there are very few roads that show the main wonder, the Grand Canyon itself. Most roads in the area would show mostly forest after forest after forest, and they aren't as tall as Yosemite's.
• New Orleans, Louisiana - Although a large city, because of the damage from global warming and/or Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and Wilma, it wouldn't be too entertaining right now, and Google might be considered inconsiderate if they did release New Orleans.
• Washington, District of Columbia - Security, security, security.