Recently Google Street View appeared even in smaller capitals like Copenhagen. But how much had been included?
I decided to start somewhere in central city, and here everything was now 3D.
Then I followed the same route home through the map, as I would have done in real life.
As I moved further away from the central areas, I kept wondering when I would encounter the flat map again;
when would 3D shift back to 2D? But, it never did...
In the end I turned around a corner, and then: I was staring at my front door. I looked up, and there was my kitchen window.
Ok, if Google had captured even my small and quite unknown street, then they must have photographed everything else as well.
Stop for a moment and wonder: who would have guessed, just a decade ago, that a searchengine would eventually visit every road, and photograph every house..?
And what will they do 10 years from now? One thing, that probably only takes a few years, is a logical further improvement: realtime maps.
All the necessary elements are already present, only yet not combined...
The present version is not real 3D, only a hybrid, interpolated from a lot of flat images. Furthermore, the maps are basically static. If you don't move, then nothing moves.
I couldn't help notice this, as Googles photos were all from summer time, while I wandered their virtual map world in the midst of winter.
The difference constantly disturbed the illusion; it was more like a past memory than an actual sensation. At least so far. But, I predict that...
When that happens, you'll be able to walk around in your city, or any other city, and watch what happens right now.
They only need to incorporate all public video cameras already existing out there. And there are really many, many more than you thought.
Try search for the present number, and you'll be amazed. Then think about the future...
However, apart from the initial 'gosh wow' effect of this, won't it invade our privacy? Indeed it will, on a massive scale. But privacy doesn't seem to trouble Google too much...
It doesn't trouble any governments either. That leaves only one part:
Does it trouble you..?
When we leave our private home, we are already used to the consequences: we are entering public space. Here everybody can see you, watch your every move. We already know that, don't we?
Yes, but our sense of 'how things are' is more or less obsolete in this case. In old days, everybody could watch us, if they too walked the same street. The new aspect is that everybody can watch us, if only they live on the same planet. and that is incredibly new...
What does an individual person know about society? What does society know about any individual?
This balance of power is shifting rapidly these years, and is not a trivial issue...