3 Reasons Google Street View Is Amazing

Google Street View is old news by now. It launched back in May. For those of you not familiar with the product, it's a new spin on maps similar to the satellite imagery already available. Except, with Street View, instead of just seeing the tops of buildings zoomed in from outer space, you can actually see the fronts of buildings as if you were walking down the street. And the photos are threaded together fairly seamlessly so that you can get a 360 degree sense of what someplace looks like while sitting in front of your computer.



Here are 3 reasons why Google Street View is amazing:

1. It revolutionizes how people use maps.

Maps have been around for a long time, even long before Christopher Columbus wondered "hmmm, what's beyond the edge of this map?" And while they've gotten more detailed and more accurate over time, they've never been able to replace the experience of knowing a location from first-hand experience. Let's face it, even reading a conventional map takes some degree of skill (ask any married couple on a roadtrip.) But when you've already been somewhere, you know the lay of the land. Other times, you ask for directions and people respond using locations. "Turn left at the Shell station, then cross the railroad tracks and go right on the street before McDonalds." These are often the most accurate directions but until now maps didn't include the Shell station or the McDonalds.

But with Google Street View, you can see it all. You know where things are and what landmarks to look for near your destination. Even better, you know what your destination looks like. No more hunting around for address numbers....you can pull up and say, "We're here!"

2. You can find places you've been but don't remember the names of.

The other day my wife and I went out to this great little Italian restaurant near our apartment in Burlingame. When a friend asked me the name of the place, I drew a blank. Then, I opened Google maps and pointed it to the general location of the restaurant. Sure, Google maps lists some businesses in the regular map view with little icons, but not all of them. When I couldn't find it, I clicked the Street View button and pointed it towards the front door of the Italian restaurant. Sure enough, they had a sign prominently displayed and Street View was high enough resolution to zoom in and read the name.

3. You can see places that you're never going to go.

I'm not suggesting you take a vacation to New York by surfing Google Street View but you could check out places that you'd otherwise never see. For example, we have friends who live in New Zealand and chances are they may never come see our place in California. I could send them a picture of our building, or even our street but Street View does a better job of this. A single photo doesn't give you a true sense of a place; it's just one snapshot. But a string of photos with a nifty navigational interface provides a pretty accurate description of what the whole environment is like, not just that one slice captured in a photo.


What do you like about Google Street View? Leave your thoughts in the comments.