COMMENTARY
It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words ... but that is only true when the context is klnown, It is never said, but a picture is one of the best ways to communicate misinformation.

Providing the integrity of Google Maps is uncompromised, a picture and a place are getting associated. This is an important first step in getting meaningful reliable information about a place.

A next step that would start to make the picture highly valuable would be some text about the picture. The text could explain something that is not obvious from the picture, starting off with 'when'. A picture of Times Square in 1911 is very different from the same place in 2011. and the same goes for most places on the planet. This suggests another dimension of the mapview which is the time series of pictures to show change over time.

More text can explain some of the socio-economic factors about the place. The TrueValueMetrics (TVM) analysis framework is suited to doing this in an efficient way. The picture becomes a part of the TVM state. The changes that are evident from the picture series over time reflect TVM progress. More text can indicate how much resources were associated with this progress, and become a measure of performance.

TVM is metrics about quality of life ... about people, environment and ecosystems. These need text, but the pictures help in the communication in a very important way. The future can be very exciting, but it still requires a huge amount of effort.
Peter Burgess

5 Magical Things About Google Maps

Bangalore: Google Maps is a web mapping service application and technology provided by Google that powers many map based services, including the Google Maps website, Google Ride Finder, Google Transit via the Google Maps API. It offers street maps, a route planner for traveling by foot, car or public transport and an urban business locator for numerous countries around the world.Here are five services provided by Google Maps for the users.

Street View Partner Program

Street View in Google Maps helps one to explore places around the world with a 360 degree street level imagery. Street View imagery is viewed millions of times each day, and enables users to explore places near and far in Google Maps.

If one manages a unique property such as a park, pedestrian mall, a university or a campus, they can request for the Street View team to visit the location. Once the Street View team visits your location, they will collect imagery using a Google car, Google trike, or even a Google snowmobile. Once the images are added to Street View, people all over the world will be able to explore your property virtually.

Google Street View Cars

The cars with mounted 360 degree cameras have been scouring the streets of Bangalore, Mumbai and New Delhi capturing photographs for Google's Street View project. Anyone can get an aerial view of your home on Google Maps but only when street view imagery goes live. The experience with Google Street view would be like just taking a walk outside your home or any location that you chose to see.

It also has GPS to track geographic positions as well as lasers that helps capture 3D data to determine distances.

3D Mirror of the World

WebGL is a software library that extends the capability of the JavaScript programming language to allow it to ge nerate interactive 3D graphics within any compatible web browser. To see these applications you need a modern graphical card and a browser with WebGL support .These pages are tested in Google Chrome and FireFox under Windows XP, 7.

Street View in Antarctica

Google's 'Street View' imagery has sparked privacy concerns in some countries but that's unlikely to be the case with its latest destination Antarctica, populated mostly by penguins.

Apparently, the internet giant has not spared any continents form its massive binoculars. It has also made its entry into the frosty South Pole. Brian McClendon, VP of Engineering at Google Earth and Maps, snapped the footage while on a recent Antarctic trek to Half Moon Island with his wife.

The Antarctica imagery is so far limited, showing panoramas of the coast and penguins of Half Moon Island.

CrashMap

CrashMap uses data collected by the police about road traffic accidents occurring on roads where someone is injured. Incidents are plotted within 10 metres of their location. The map therefore provides a great guide to accident black spots.

It is possible to search the map by location and to refine the results to show just fatal, serious or slight accidents. Results for a single year can also be projected. To view details about individual car crashes users have to register and buy credits.