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Google Captures 'Street View' of Underwater Habitats
hypnosec writes "Google has released the first-ever underwater 'street view' images of some of the world's most famous undersea locations — the Great Barrier Reef, Hawaii's Hanauma Bay, and Apo Island in the Philippines. Google collaborated with Caitlin Seaview Survey using a specialized SVII camera to capture the amazing underwater images. The camera travels at 2.5 mph, capturing a 360-degree panorama with geolocation information and a compass heading every 3 seconds."
Check it out.
On the other side of the coin, that trip to tel aviv can now be replaced by going somewhere new.
Apple was actually first on this, with their mapping of sub-oceanic starbucks.
Surely looking at Tel Aviv through an iPad with an especially low power draw would offset an awful lot of carbon that otherwise would have been spewed into the atmosphere by flying you there to reminisce...
Seeing these places in person will never be matched by seeing them on a monitor, no matter how good the resolution gets. What this does do is open up these places to a whole segment of the population without the means to get there. It's a much richer experience to "walk" down the street in street view and explore a bit on your own than to see a static picture from a fixed vantage point in a book.
I have worked in seniors facilities helping take care of shut ins and what Google has done with street view is a wonderful thing. There is nothing more satisfying than watching a 90 year old who was born in a Dublin slum cry as you walk them down the shanty streets where they grew up.
Piss on all the fud that "Google is evil, you can't trust them with your data" that many anti Google paid shill "high tech pundits" are currently spreading.
Sorry but in the real world what Google has done for those who can't get out is wonderful and beyond that think about how important it is to allow others to actually see your culture and how you live. If someone in China can look at a town in Northern Canada and see the actual poverty of Native Indians or see remote places and poor districts in Chicago I do not find it wrong. They will know that we as a people exist not that differently from them in their ghettos and slums. Is this really a bad thing?
DO not for one second think that Google's street view is just about that which is perfect in the world. I would highly encourage Google to also use the underwater street view in a few places that would make some people cringe and take notice of what has happened to the environment where people are not just eco tourists as well.