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As of this week Google Street View now indexes all 50 states in the United States. Hawaii was the last state that got added to Google Street View. Using Street View you can now take a virtual vacation of the beaches in Oahu and Maui. The announcement was made by Google Product Marketing Manager Laura Melahn on the Google Blog.
I’m adding this as another odd picture that was captured by Google Street View cars. To find out some of the funny and useful pictures that was found Street View cars, check out our gallery.
When the Google Street View was driving around on Robinglade Rd. in Toronto, Ontario a picture was caught of a van on fire. The Toronto Star newspaper company investigated the situation after discovering the photo. The guy that owns the red van that is shown in the background was able to move his car in time before the fire spread to his own car. Nobody was hurt and the explosion was just limited to the white van itself.
Jaycee Lee Dugard was a kidnapping and rape victim of Phillip Garrido. Dugard was kidnapped from her home in South Lake Tahoe about 18 years ago when she was age 11. Garrido, the kidnapper will face 29 felony charges which include rape and kidnapping. His wife will also be charged. Dugard was kept in a tent and in sheds along in the couple’s backyard along with the two daughters she had with Garrido. This is one of the most chilling news articles to have surfaced within the last week.
Garrido has a personal blog on Blogger that is now flooded with hate comments. After the jump is a screenshot of some of the hate comments he has received. But another chilling discovery that was found on the Internet regarding Garrido is a mystery van following a Google Street View vehicle. The van was suspected to belong to Garrido himself. Pictures of the van following the Street View car are posted on BoingBoing. Above is one of the pictures of the van.
Perhaps the reason why the van followed the Google Street View car was because it had cameras all over it. Anyone snooping around anywhere with cameras are usually uninvited.
Two Dutch twin brothers robbed a teenager in the town of Groningen, The Netherlands. Looks like those robbers had bad timing because a Google Street View camera caught them committing the crime red-handed.
“The picture was taken just a moment before the crime,” stated one of the police officers. The robbers stole 165 Euros and a mobile phone from the 14 year old victim last September. This past March, the victim saw himself on Google Street View and the two robbers on camera.
The police investigated the crime after the boy reported the Google Street View evidence. One of the 24 year old boys confessed robbing the boy after being questioned. The punishment that will be made against the robbers is unknown. But this further proves that Google Street View can do more good than harm.
In order to capture images for their Street View service, Google normally has cars drive around. These cars have been caught hitting a deer and was formed out of a London neighborhood by a human chain. But I guarantee you that this news is a first when I say that a Google Street View cameraman has been caught on a tricycle…. That’s right, a tricycle. Watch this guy ride his bike with the Street View cameras attached on the back. They should give this guy a bike horn in case he runs into any human chains or deer.
The data protection agency in Greece made an announcement yesterday that Google Street View cars are banned from taking any more images for the service.
Street View isn’t allowed to take further pictures pending “additional information” from Google. The data protection agency wants to know from Google how long they intend to keep the images that they take and what steps Google is taking to alert residents about their photographs being taken.
The Greek Data Protection Authority has also banned a similar service run by an ISP called Kapou. Kapou has been taking pictures in the streets of Athens, Thessaloniki, and Larissa.
Google Street View has been in the hot seat around Europe lately. Recently a “human chain” prevented a Street View car from taking pictures around London. Street View also recently had to remove an image of a man vomiting after a stag party in London.
Google Street View remains to be one of the my most favorite services. Notably because Street View captures some of the most funniest moments on camera whether it is a guy throwing up or a man dressed like Waldo. This time Google Street View knocked down their own camera by driving under a low bridge and photographed the incident.
The bridge involved is on Merchant Street in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Check out the below screenshots:
Here is the bridge.
Here are pictures that the knocked down camera took of the Google Street View car itself. D’oh!
Google Street View has been the subject of controversy overseas, especially in the U.K. Street View has been fully embraced in the United States and has even been used to stop crimes. But in the U.K. privacy groups have been reportedly wanting to have the service shut down within a few days after the service launched. Street View launched in the U.K. on March 19.
A lobby group in the U.K. called Privacy International filed a complaint to the Information Commissioner (ICO). The PI wants to have Street View suspended until ICO investigates the service.
“We agree with the concerns over privacy,” stated Google CEO Eric Schmidt. “The way we address it is by allowing people to opt out, literally to take anything we capture that is inappropriate out,” he said “and we do it as quickly as we possibly can.”
Recently several angry villagers in Buckinghamshire created a human chain to prevent a Google Street View car from taking pictures of their neighborhood. Resident Paul Jacobs quickly confronted the driver and put together an impromptu mob. The mob quickly surrounded the black Opal Astra car driving around to take pictures. The Astra had to turn around and leave because of the mob. Jacobs went as far as calling Street View a “burglar’s dream.”
In that same neighborhood there were about three cases of breaking and entering within the last six weeks. That neighborhood was paranoid that Street View would help facilitate these crimes.
Late last month, Google Street View in the U.K. caught an image of a man regurgitating in the middle of the street in London after leaving a stag party. Google Street View U.K. also found Waldo waving at the cameras.
If you search for “77 Putney High St, Wandsworth, England, United Kingdom” on Google Maps and turn on Switch View you will noticed a man sporting a red and white striped hat and shirt, jeans, and a cane. That is right, folks we’ve found Waldo!
The Google Sightseeing team were the ones that first spotted Waldo and they announced it on their Twitter profile. Waldo was found standing in front of an O2 phone shop and he waved at the camera car as it drove by.
Google Street View has about 22,369 miles in the UK mapped across major cities such as London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Oxford, and Manchester.
I still can’t decide whether I find this picture more entertaining or the man throwing up in the streets of London after a stag party.
Google has seen its fair share of controversy for going around in cars and taking pictures for their Street View service. One of the latest examples is this British man regurgitating on the streets of London after a stag party in daylight.
Even though this poor guy doesn’t have access to the porcelain throne, he has an antler-hat-wearing friend to hold his hair up and watch his back.
Long story short, the British complained and the photo was quickly removed.
A case has been dismissed between Google and the Borings. The lawsuit involved the Street View mapping service entering private property. The ruling was issued by Judge Amy Reynolds Hay in a Pennsylvania court. Aaron and Christine Boring filed the lawsuit against Google last year. The Boring couple believed that Google violated their privacy when the Street View camera car drove past their driveway even though there was a “private road” sign.
In the case, Google’s law team stated that “complete privacy does not exist” and then mentioned that photos of the couple’s home and floor plans were already available on the Internet. The photos were on the Allegheny County assessor’s office website.
Google also pointed out that they make sure to take adequate measures to protect the privacy by allowing individuals to have pictures of their property removed from the map.
“While it is easy to imagine that many whose property appears on Google’s virtual maps resent the privacy implications, it is hard to believe that any—other than the most exquisitely sensitive—would suffer shame or humiliation. The Plaintiffs have not alleged facts to convince the Court otherwise,” stated Judge Hay in the decision.
The Judge pointed out the irony with the situation. The Borings didn’t opt to have the images removed from Street View and in fact drew more attention to themselves by suing Google.
“‘Googling’ the name of the Borings’ attorney demonstrates that publicity regarding this suit has perpetuated dissemination of the Borings’ names and location, and resulted in frequent re-publication of the Street View images,” added Judge Hay. “The Plaintiffs’ failure to take readily available steps to protect their own privacy and mitigate their alleged pain suggests to the Court that the intrusion and the their suffering were less severe than they contend.”
Google Street View is a feature that is built in Google Maps. Anyone using Google Maps can click Street View and see what it looks like to walk down the road in front of specific addresses. Google captures these pictures by driving around cars with 360 view cameras on top of them. Google has been quiet about the cars they send around, but sometimes they are caught in the wild.
Recently in upstate New York, a Google Street View car hit a baby deer on Five Points Road and had been recording the whole time. “The driver was understandably upset, and promptly stopped to alert the local police and the Street View team at Google. The deer was able to move and had left the area by the time the police arrived. The police explained to our driver that, sadly, this was not an uncommon occurrence in the region — the New York State Department of Transportation estimates that 60,000-70,000 deer collisions happen per year in New York alone — and no police report needed to be filed,” wrote Wendy Wang, Street View Operations Manager.
I think that this is one of those pictures that needs to be archived and added to a top list of Street View pictures.
Natalie Maltais was kidnapped by her grandmother. Natalie’s legal guardians called the police when her grandmother threatened that they may never see the girl again. Natalie had a cellphone and when the police called the number, they were able to track her approximate location. The cellphone company provided the GPS coordinates within 300 feet of each other.
The police knew that Natalie was in Rhode Island and that she was around the Virginia Route 11 near the Natural Bridge. Deputy Chief Lozier then used Street View using Google Maps to scan the location where the cellphone was located. Using Street View, Lozier was able to look up and down the intersection. He noticed a short building near the highway that looked like a motel. Lozier searched for motels in the area.
It turned out that it was a Budget Inn where Natalie and her grandmother was. “I told Todd if I was going to throw the dice, I’d throw them there,” stated Lozier. Lozier was referring to Officer Todd Neale, who was also on the case. “When I got that call from Todd that they found them, that was a good call,” stated Lozier.
