Canada Coming Soon?

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There used to be some Street View coverage for Canada, but it has been removed. The Google car has certainly been to Canada, but all Canadian Street View imagery has been kept off of the Internet.

However, past events in Street View history show that Canadian Street View might not be too far away.

As you may have heard, MapJack and Canpages have teamed up to produce street-level panoramas for Canada already. This is similar to previous companies trying to outdo Google.

1. EveryScape released imagery for the city of Washington on April 7, 2008. On November 4, Google released imagery for Washington, Baltimore, and Seattle. EveryScape hasn't made the news since.
2. Seety released imagery for London on October 16, 2008. On March 18, 2009, Google released imagery for all major cities in the United Kingdom, along with more American, Dutch, French, Italian, and Spanish locations. Seety is no longer updating their website.

If Google continues to impress us with tremendous updates like those, we could expect Canadian Street View to show up in time for the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver.

However, there is one thing I feel I must remind you about: there have been no major Street View car sightings anywhere in Canada yet, so please don't get too excited. This blog's predictions on the right only include locations where Google cars have been spotted.

Also, there must be a reason why Google imagery stops right at the Canadian border. We'll have to find out, eh?

First Update of 2009

Good news, Street View Stuff readers! More Street View imagery has been added all over Europe: in France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom. You can see this for yourself at maps.google.com.

Some interesting notes about this update:

• Some coverage for the island of Sardinia has been added.
• Although none or few Street View car sightings were reported there, there is Street View coverage for the Belfast area of Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom.
• There is no coverage of The Hague in the Netherlands.
• Some French Street View comes very close to Germany, but there is none in Germany at all. This was predicted, however; although there were reports that German Street View would be released in Spring 2009, there were also some legal issues that Germany (and Switzerland) used to prevent Google's imagery from being made available on the service.

Have fun exploring the new Views!

Google Visits Ireland

According to the Irish Times, Google has reported that they will be adding coverage to five major cities in the Republic of Ireland:

1. Cork
   
2. Dublin
3. Galway
4. Limerick
5. Waterford

Google has not released any dates for this release, but the timing of the announcement is somewhat appropriate.

Please Don't Put My Planet on the Internet

Joal Anderson is a legislator from California. He must have heard one of the following false statements:

• Google Earth is a crime tool.
• Google Earth is a threat to security.
• Blurring Google Earth imagery and Street View imagery will save us.

Because that's exactly what he's proposing with Assembly Bill 255, according to Macworld.

If passed, not only would many buildings have to be blurred out in Google Earth, the same would have to be done with Google's Street View feature.

Street View Imagery Coverage by Nation

Here is a bar graph of the amount of Street View coverage by nation:

Google might want to improve their European coverage, no?

Photo Fun!

Street View has been given a small makeover: while viewing Street View in Google Maps, there is a border around the Street View window that will turn blue when you hover over the "x".

But the biggest and most exciting change about Street View is a new feature called user photos.

Now, when you view popular Street Views in Barcelona, New York, New Zealand, Rome, San Francisco, Sydney, and Tokyo, a small image thumbnail will appear in the Street View's upper-right corner with the caption "User Photos".

Clicking this icon will adjust the Street View and open the first of a whole set of photos provided by Panoramio users. Panoramio, a service from Google, is a great way to share your geolocated photos. Google has reviewed many of these millions of pictures, and placed them into Street View for your enjoyment.

This new feature can be very useful for Street Views with not-so-good-looking atmosphere, like some taken on dark, cloudy days. User photos, I predict, will soon be popping up all over the Street View world. That would be fun!

Imágenes de las Islas

According to the Gran Canario Info Forum, a Google Street View car has been found in the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago of the coast of northwestern Africa.

As one member pointed out in the forum, the sides of the black Street View van were quite dented. Someone is a bit too concerned about privacy, perhaps?

Agaete, the location of the sighting, has been added to this blog's "Upcoming Street View Locations" Google My Map.

Exciting Results of Boring Lawsuit

You may have heard about the lawsuit on Google by Aaron and Christina Boring. You can read more about it here and here.

Well, the results have been talked about all over the Internet: Google won! Again! Actually, the case was dismissed by a federal court judge.

The images are still taken down for privacy, but Street View is still available to us on Google Maps and Google Earth. Hopefully, this feature will still be here in the future.

Pete's Privacy

According to The Boston Globe, a man named Peter Funt is concerned about Google Street View invading his privacy. This is not unusual, but there really is nothing to worry about with Google Street View, for many reasons that have been listed before.

Today, another Globe article talks about Peter Funt's concern that burglars could find his home's open window on the second floor and take it as an invitation to come rob his house. Hey, Peter? How about just locking the window?

Lately, Google released a new service called Latitude, which you can use to track your friends' locations with your phones. Mr. Funt calls the service "eavesdropping". As pointed out by the Globe's Michael Sierra, Latitude is an "opt-in" service, which is not eavesdropping. Thank you, Mr. Sierra.

Make Your Own Street View

At Gizmodo, Adam Frucci has started a Street View-themed Photoshop Contest.

Adam writes:

We're always finding strange things in Google Street View. But there are some things that, chances are, we'll never, ever see using the service. Let's change that.

If you have Photoshop and some Photoshopping skills, you can send your entries to Adam at contests@gizmodo.com by February 10, 2009.