Digital mapping and photography can bring the world closer together. The problem is, for some people, that’s too close.
Where travelers see great ways to track where they’re going, data protection advocates see voyeurism. And the trend is only growing.
Hobby photographers are putting their pictures up on services like Flickr while tourism agencies are posting webcams to highlight their promenades and beaches. Meanwhile, mapmakers aren’t just producing paper maps, but detailed online city plans with images linked to specific street addresses.
More pictures of our world are always finding their way online and, thanks to Google, Bing and the like, a lot of them are only a click away.
It’s clear who is using these services. Vacationers tired of pouring over travel brochures would rather click to a webcam to check things out themselves to see if there’s a nearby disco or whether the beach is as close as advertised. People considering moving can check their neighborhoods out digitally without leaving their home.
The services are also helpful to those on the go. Anyone with a multimedia mobile phone can use it for directions to the closest Mongolian restaurant, checking out the menu online while underway (assuming the establishment has posted it online). Once that’s done, the mobile can then help the user find the train schedule for the way home.
“Our vision is to bring the entire Internet into one map,” says Raphael Leiteritz, responsible for Google’s StreetView project in Europe. The system links panoramic views of individual homes to satellite maps.
And the search giant isn’t the only one who wants to recreate the map. Microsoft has a similar service — Photosynth — up and running in 56 US cities. Users can upload images or panoramic videos and link them to a site, making them generally available or only to those in a group…