Couple sues Google because their home is on Google Maps Street View

A couple in Pennsylvania has decided to try to cash in on Google's wealth and sue the California-based company for putting images of the couples house online at Google Maps Street View. Since the images were taken from a public road I'm not sure they even have a case but it will be interesting to see how it develops.

A Pittsburgh couple has sued Google because photos of their house are now on Google Maps Street View. They allege that ever since the photos have appeared on Street View, the value of their property has plummeted. Property records indicate that the domicile was purchased for a cool $163,000, which, I’m pretty sure, wouldn’t buy a garbage can in any livable city in this country.

They want some $25,000 in damages from The Google. (source)

Google Earth Showed Protesters Way To Conquer Parliament

Demonstrators revealed yesterday that they had used Google Earth to plot their protest on the roof of the Houses of Parliament last week against the expansion of Heathrow.

The website, which allows users to zoom in on satellite photographs of Earth, “showed us all the walkways, steps and other details we needed to make our way across the roof from the door to the far side where the public could see us”, said Leo Murray, one of the five protesters.

The planning for the stunt began last autumn after the government published documents for a public consultation on a possible third runway at Heathrow.“What really enraged us was the government saying it supported the idea [of a third runway] even before the consultation began,” said Murray, 31, a postgraduate student in animation. “The consultation was also rigged to exclude almost any mention of climate change.”

Tamsin Omond, a 23-year-old with a first-class degree in English literature from Cambridge, described how they were able to map out the interior of the Palace of Westminster without raising suspicions. “We sent in a reconnaissance group who simply wandered around till they found the route to the roof ending in an open door. The fag butts around it showed it was being used by smokers,” she said.They managed to recruit a young Commons insider who, thanks to having a security pass, was able to carry the banners, handcuffs (bought from a Soho sex shop) and other equipment past the body scanners and X-ray machines that are supposed to protect the buildings. (...more)

A Modern “Where’s Waldo” on a Google Maps

Were you one of those kids that could sit in a corner with a giant “Where’s Waldo” book and pour over it for hours? Eventually you realized that Waldo was likely to appear in different areas on each page, and was always smiling (usually walking), and always wore that goofy outfit. And eventually the Waldo creators attempted to make the act of finding Waldo increasingly difficult by surrounding him with similarly clad geeks, and other tactics.

Nevertheless, the novelty wore off, and our kids are left with increasingly difficult video games that require years of logic and acts of deduction in order to achieve a winning status. But if you don’t mind still staring at a digital screen instead of paper, there’s a new geography game that’s a bit reminiscent of the Waldo books of yore. The new game is called placeSpotting, and it’s a Google Maps mashup.

Google Street View Maps Update

The Google Street View Maps has updated with new cities this last month. I saw a few cities pop up in the middle of the month including Milwaukee, Wisconsin, while I did my weekly look for the Knoxville, Tennessee, layer of Google Street View Maps.

The Google Street View layer is starting to get crowded as they seem to add a handful each month. I found by mistake (after zooming out) that somewhere along the line they added Juneau, Alaska. Time to start looking for some moose.

Get ready to Google-ize your health records

Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt will detail the company's plans for Google-izing the health care industry at a health care trade show on Thursday morning, starting with a consumer destination site called Google Health.

Schmidt is scheduled to give the morning keynote speech at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) 2008 annual conference here and will outline Google's vision on tackling the next Internet frontier of medical data. The move, rumored for a few years, makes sense, given how much people use the Web to get health information and how much they spend on medicines and health care.

Mother Stunned To Find Daughter On Google

A Garden City mom was surprised and outraged to find pictures of her children on a Google Map Search Internet page.

"I have rules when my daughters are on the Internet," said Toni Rizkallah of Garden City. "They don't give their address, their names, no personal information."

Rizkallah said she and her daughters discovered the pictures when the children decided to "Google their address." To the girls' surprise, and Rizkallah's dismay, the search turned up a virtual tour of their neighborhood, which includes a picture of the girls, in bathing suits, in their backyard swimming pool. (source)

The Bible According to Google Earth

The Crucifixion

(via Mental Floss) Here’s a cool idea realized: a Sydney, Australia-based art collective called The Glue Society has re-created scenes from the Bible as if captured by Google Earth’s ubiquitous satellites. Says Glue Society’s James Dive: “We like to disorientate audiences a little with all our work. And with this piece we felt technology now allows events which may or may not have happened to be visualized and made to appear dramatically real. As a method of representation satellite photography is so trusted, it has been interesting to mess with that trust.” Let’s see what they created!

The Garden of Eden

Noah and That Large Boat of His

Parting of the Red Sea

Google Earth Heading Towards Extinction?

Google has announced two new features for Google Maps that mimic features in Google Earth, begging the question: is Google Earth on borrowed time?

The first new feature is the additional of terrain in Google Maps. The terrain fly over feature has long been available in Google Earth, but now you can fly over a map and see the contours of the land, all without the need to download Google Earth.

The second new feature mimics the community contribution feature of Google Earth. "Our Maps" brings wiki-style collaboration to Google Maps, with users able to annotate places and share those notes with friends or the greater public.

• Google Earth Heading Towards Extinction? >

Geography Awareness Week (Nov. 11th-17th)

My Wonderful World, a National Geographic-led campaign for geographic literacy, and Google are working together to provide an interactive educational experience about our world. We are proud to celebrate Geography Awareness Week (Nov. 11th-17th), an initiative by National Geographic that promotes the importance of geography.

Each year, Geography Awareness Week has a different focus area. For 2007, the theme is "Asia: Continent of Contrasts." So whether you're a teacher, student, or armchair geographer, it's a great way to polish up your skills and learn all about Asia's fascinating cultures, natural wonders, animals and more.

• Geography Awareness Week >

Google Earth Heads For The Stars

Google Earth has added more time killing fun with Sky for Google Earth. Check out the latest version of Google Earth to get the Sky layer which allows users to “explore the universe from the comfort of your chair.”

The Sky layer allows you to view and explore the universe just like regular Google Earth. There are information balloons and timelapse orbits to illustrate the planets relationships. You can zoom in on galaxies that are hundreds of millions of light years away, or explore the constellations and even witness a supernova explosion.

Explore the sky in Google Earth 4.2

google earth

GIS Sites News

Space Shuttle Endeavour

How the world really shapes up

We all know what the world looks like. But a new series of extraordinary maps shows our planet in a very different light. Rather than defining each country by size, these computer-generated modified maps - or cartograms - redraw the globe with each country's size proportionate to its strengths, or weaknesses, in a whole series of categories. For instance, when it comes to military spending, the U.S. appears bloated, but Africa is huge when HIV prevalence is mapped. The cartograms were produced in a unique collaboration between the universities of Michigan in the U.S. and Sheffield. Here are images and more details on some of the most fascinating... [more]

Earth From Space - Amazing Photos

A nice gallery of pictures of our Earth as seen from above. It is a rather large gallery of various NASA picts and satellite imagery. [more]

World Drinking Map

A quick graphic that shows the drinking age from around the world. A few lucky countries clock in below our age of 21 but I really enjoy how the mapper labels the areas with no information. [more]

One of the worlds most puzzling mysteries: the moving rocks of Death Valley

Deep in the heart of the California desert lies one of the natural world's most puzzling mysteries: the moving rocks of Death Valley. These are not ordinary moving rocks that tumble down mountainsides in avalanches, are carried along riverbeds by flowing water, or are tossed aside by animals. These rocks, some as heavy as 700 pounds, are inexplicably transported across a virtually flat desert plain, leaving erratic trails in the hard mud behind them, some hundreds of yards long. They move by some mysterious force, and in the nine decades since we have known about them, no one has ever seen them move. [more]

China to map ‘every inch’ of moon surface

BEIJING - China aims to chart every inch of the moon’s surface, the chief scientist of the country’s first lunar exploration program said in comments published on Friday. China, which plans to launch a lunar orbiter called ”Chang’e One” in the second half of 2007 to take 3D images, would aim to land an unmanned vehicle on its surface by 2010, official news portal Chinanews.com quoted Ouyang Ziyuan as saying. “Currently, our country’s lunar exploration program is divided into three phases—orbiting the moon, landing on the moon and returning back to Earth,” Ouyang said. [more]

Human Layer On Google Maps

How's my hair?

Google Maps has a new layer called "Street View" that allows the view to go to the ground level and drive along the streets with a full view that you can tilt, zoom, and view 360-degrees. I call it the Human Layer because it takes you down to our level and captures our actions and daily life. They drive a van mounted with camera equipment through the city and capture the pictures. I even found a pic of the Google Van in San Francisco.

Google Van in S.F.

This doesn't mark the first time people were included in mapping. One of the more popular things on Google Earth is trying to catch people, vehicles, or odd happenings. However, the detail is nothing compared to reading license plates on Street View I even found Yahoo! ads in Google Maps which is cool because it means they are not censoring.

Yahoo Ad in Times Square

However, I'm wondering what legal rights they have for posting people, license plates, and personal information online. While I'm sure someone will raise a stink I don't know what can be done about it. The Street View maps were made by mounting camera equipment on top of a van and driving through the city.

Hey, baby!

• Getting out of the car
• Visiting the Adult Book Store
• Strip club?
• Steve Jobs House
• Jogger
• Rollerblading in NYC
• Dude checking out girl
• Some butt crack
• Catching Google in the act?

It's easy being green: Google goes solar

Google's commitment to "green" means that the company sources carpet and sofas made without PVC, paints without volatile organic compounds, and cafeteria food from local growers. It's not surprising, then, that they would roll out the largest commercial solar deployment in the US—a 1.6MW installation that covers most of the buildings at Google's campus and extends even to shaded parking spaces. At the ETech conference in San Diego this week, Google's Anthony Ravitz explained how Google did it, and why.

The move to solar made sense for Google, and not just "hippie Gaia-loving" sense. Ravitz said that Google will earn its investment back in 7.5 years, after which it will continue to enjoy inexpensive power for decades. With the company sprawled across a large campus of many low buildings, roof space was easily available. Solar also has the unique property of pumping out more energy when power is the most expensive—peak afternoon hours. When air conditioners across California kick into action on sunny days, Google generates the most power. [...continue article]

Google wins key ruling in patent dispute over Earth software

Online search leader Google Inc. has won a key court ruling in a patent dispute over its popular three-dimensional software that provides Internet tours of the Earth.

In a summary judgment issued Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Douglas Woodlock in Massachusetts decided that Google Earth doesn't infringe on a patent issued to Skyline Software Systems Inc. in 2002.

Skyline, a privately held company in Chantilly, Va., had been pursuing a patent infringement claim since 2004 when it first sued Keyhole Inc., whose technology powers Google Earth. Mountain View-based Google bought Keyhole for an undisclosed amount in October 2004.

Keyhole's 3-D technology powers mapping software that ranks among Google's biggest successes outside of its search engine. Google said its Earth software has been downloaded more than 100 million times [...continue article]

Vista Sidebar Traffic Gadget is released

The new Microsoft Vista Traffic Gadget exposes traffic Flow information for all of the cities that Live Maps has traffic flow data for, currently 24 major metros in the US. You can install the Traffic gadget from the gallery.

Not that I have Vista or plan to get it anytime soon, but it's nice to know that new technology is taking mapping and GIS very serious. The Google Earth & Microsoft Virtual Earth battle is being incorporated into new software very easily.

Australia gets roads, KML search details

Last week Australia got directions in Google Earth, and just now it got roads too. The alignment between road data and imagery looks good in Sydney, Perth and Canberra. In Melbourne, not so much.

The much publicized Google Mapping of Australia that began last month no doubt worked as a good promotion for the already popular Google Earth.

Real stories about real people trying to get on Google Maps

As Google Maps scans Australia, the people and media are all over waiting for their chance to caught on the Google. Check out the wing on the plane to the left. Google's logo is clearly marked. Check out more from Google Maps Mania.

Google Sydney Aerial Photo Shoot Update

As feared, the photo shoot did not go as planned. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the plane Google hired was unable to get approval for the flight plan it had filed and it did not fly in all the locations or at the times Google had announced. So, many of the people who had arrived did not get their photos taken as planned. As mentioned last week, holding an aerial photograph as a PR event is very risky. [via Google Earth Blog]

Very cool satellite image of a SR71 Black Bird

Very cool satellite image of a SR71 Black Bird on an Aircraft Carrier via Google Maps!!!

GOOGLE MAPS GETS LOST!

GOOGLE MAPS gets lost and doesn't ask for directions. Funny!