Sarx

Google is demo-ing their new “Streetview” service. Go here to see a demo. I took a walk through San Francisco, visiting all my old hoods. It was way cool.

No, I don’t think we’ll soon see a Street View of Asheville – or any other smaller towns. But SF is nearly all done. Manhattan is nearly all done – although they made some odd choices: 42nd Street was not done – but all N/S routes were. And no other Boroughs in NYC are yet covered.

But it you want to see 815 Second Ave (NYC), or 500 DeHaro St (SF), or find out if it looks safe to walk to 995 Market Street from the nearest MUNI station (generally, no) it’s a cool way to take a scan. The pics seem to be taken from a moving vehicle with a sort of fish-eye. Sometimes you see reflections in the window, sometimes it gets blurry.

Sometimes you can zoom into a shot. From here on the corner of 8th Street and Mina (SF), you can zoom a bit down Mina and see my old apartment (on the bottom left).

Update: actually the pics were taken by a Totally Geeked Out Toyota