Posted 11/01/09 at 12:30:35 PM by Bart Salisbury

 For Google, the rubber has got to meet the road at some point for its investment in Google Maps. Only so much can be generated from ads, and many mappable services--restaurants, gas stations, speciality stores and the like--can’t add much more than a trickle to a hoped for stream of revenue. Google has decided to expand its maps into a market that can pay: real estate.

Back in July Google Maps added the ability to directly view real estate listings. In the mean time Google has added some new features to make this facility easier to use, including brand new high-resolution Street View imagery (so you can see what slobs your potential neighbors might be), and more detailed map data.

In addition, the real estate listings are now easier to find. And not just real estate for sale, but rentals and foreclosures as well. (Nothing like making a buck on the misfortune of others, is there.) According to the Google Lat Long Blog, “you can simply select "Real Estate" from the 'More' button on the top right of any Google Map to discover listings.  From there, it's a simple matter to refine your search using the left hand panel - price, bedrooms, bathrooms, and so on.” You can hunt down real estate in the Untied States, Australia, New Zealand and India. (India?)

’d like to report back how well Google Maps new real estate search feature works, but, as the image below shows, the referred to “Real Estate” option under the “More” button is pretty obviously absent.

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Posted 10/30/09 at 02:59:24 PM by Bart Salisbury

 For Google, the rubber has got to meet the road at some point for its investment in Google Maps. Only so much can be generated from ads, and many mappable services--restaurants, gas stations, speciality stores and the like--can’t add much more than a trickle to a hoped for stream of revenue. Google has decided to expand its maps into a market that can pay: real estate.

Back in July Google Maps added the ability to directly view real estate listings. In the mean time Google has added some new features to make this facility easier to use, including brand new high-resolution Street View imagery (so you can see what slobs your potential neighbors might be), and more detailed map data.

In addition, the real estate listings are now easier to find. And not just real estate for sale, but rentals and foreclosures as well. (Nothing like making a buck on the misfortune of others, is there.) According to the Google Lat Long Blog, “you can simply select "Real Estate" from the 'More' button on the top right of any Google Map to discover listings.  From there, it's a simple matter to refine your search using the left hand panel - price, bedrooms, bathrooms, and so on.” You can hunt down real estate in the Untied States, Australia, New Zealand and India. (India?)

I’d like to report back how well Google Maps new real estate search feature works, but, as the image below shows, the referred to “Real Estate” option under the “More” button is pretty obviously absent.

Read More

Posted 10/23/09 at 09:02:59 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Google announced today that they were making the first major changes to their maps interface since the initial launch. The changes are mostly based around making it easier to pick out details at all zoom levels. The changes affect the regular ‘maps’ view, as well as ‘hybrid’ view.

Many of the changes are subtle at first glance. For instance, in the maps view, the width of roads has been reduced allowing for better legibility. Arterial roads have, in the past, looked inflated to the point that they covered map details. The crisper lines are certainly a welcome change. The color scheme has also been toned down a bit.

In hybrid mode, the roads have a new outline to make them easier to follow against the background. These changes have allowed more information to be displayed at various zoom levels. While zooming from a national view, to a local one, you’ll see smaller roads become visible sooner. Fonts have also been changed to increase contrast. Hit the read link to see all the samples. How do you like the changes? Do you think you would have noticed?

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Posted 10/16/09 at 05:05:38 PM by Jason Barry

Dan Ratner, Senior Mechanical Engineer for Google Street View, envisioned the Street View service being able to map parts of the world that cannot be driven. Bike trails, university campuses, amusement parks all could benefit from the Street View mapping system, but at the time, the technology did not exist to explore these areas and record them digitally.

Enter, Google Trike. It is basically a monster tricycle with the Street View camera stuck on its back. However, it opens the possibilities of exploring remote places in more detail from the comfort of your home.

Ratner announced today a massive suggestion bin for places people would like the Google Trike to go. The suggestion site will be open and taking nominations until October 28th. Here, you can also check out some already existing Google Trike explorations of LEGOLAND, San Diego State, Santa Monica Pier, and Monterey Bay bike trail.

Check out the video after the jump.  Got any good ideas?

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Posted 10/02/09 at 08:05:24 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Apple may be gearing up to boot Google Maps from the iPhone. Back in July Apple purchased mapping company PlaceBase. PlaceBase has a reputation for being very customizable with a rich set of APIs. This might make it ideal for adaptation to the iPhone.

Apple has relied on map tiles from Google since the iPhone launched in 2007. After the fiasco that was the Google Voice rejection, it’s not completely unthinkable that they might want to move away from Google technology on the iPhone platform. Consumers expect high quality map applications on phones these days. So this may be a risky way for Apple to deal with its Google dependence.

Is it possible that a future iPhone OS update might replace Google Maps with a new Apple branded maps app using Placebase? If that happened, would we at least get some sort of Google Latitude app?

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Posted 08/26/09 at 10:21:54 AM by Paul Lilly

Nothing blows more than sitting in a traffic jam for two hours as you inch your way to your destination 25 miles down the road. Should you get off at the next exit and try your luck on the surface roads instead?

Looking to take the guesswork out of those kinds of scenarios, Google announced that its Google Maps will now show you live traffic conditions on arterial roads in selected cities. All you have to do is select the city you're stuck in and click the "Traffic" button in the upper-right corner of the map.

"As you zoom in closer to an area of interest, we'll color the arterial roads, in addition to the highways, to show current traffic conditions," Google wrote in a blog entry. "Just as with the highways, the colors correspond to the speed of traffic (relative to the speed limit of the road): green is free sailing, yellow is medium congestion, red is heavy congestion, and red/black is stop-and-go traffic."

And it works for Google Maps for Mobile, too.

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Posted 03/20/09 at 04:25:21 PM by Paul Lilly

With the recent addition of Great Britain, Google Maps' Street View service is now available in seven countries. The recent expansion includes 25 cities in the UK, including London, Glasgow, and Oxford, potentially opening the door to more complaints from those who would voice privacy concerns over the service.

"The images you see on Street View are the same images you would see if you were to walk or drive down the road yourself," said Ed Parsons, geospatial technologist for Google. "If people do not want their homes featured we will take them down, or cut them out of the image."

The problem, from the perspective of privacy advocates, is that not only is it an opt-out service, but as our very own Tom Edwards points out, once the picture is posted certain images are still viewable by scrolling back a block on the map and zooming in on deleted content.

Nevertheless, Google's Street View feature isn't all controversial. Back in January, it was learned that Boston police used Street View to help solve a kidnapping case by tracing the coordinates of an abducted 9-year-old girl's phone to a location in Virginia. The police used Street View to help identify possible hideouts for the kidnapper, leading local cops to nab the suspect.

Pros and cons aside, Google plans to expand its Street View service to more cities in Great Britain in the future.

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Posted 12/17/08 at 04:36:15 PM by Andy Salisbury

Now that Google has had a few months to work out any potential kinks in the system, Google Maps is now officially offering YouTube integration. Once you choose to add the video layer from the “more” menu (the same one that’ll get you to Wikipedia), you can check out any videos that have been geotagged!

For those that used the previous add-on version, you’ll find little different. Aesthetically, you’ll notice that the actual video will be cut down (removing the play count and video information) so to make presentation easier, and the videos will appear on the map as a thumbnail instead of a small red dot.

I, for one, can’t wait to see what people start filming because of this. Sure, there might be boring videos here and there of people checking out barren stretches of highway that no one will ever see (which I actually think is kind of neat), but this does provide an opportunity to make the world seem a little bit smaller.

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