Slashdot Mirror
Germany Fines Google Over Street View - But Says €145k Is Too Small
judgecorp writes "Germany's privacy regulator has fined Google €145,000 over its Street View cars' harvesting of private data — but the official has complained that the size of the fine is too small, because of limits to the fines regulators can impose. German data protection commissioner Johannes Caspar said the fine was too low, for 'one of the largest known data breachers ever,' saying, 'as long as privacy violations can be punished only at discount prices, enforcement of data protection law in the digital world with its high abuse potential is hardly possible.' In 2010 it emerged that Google's Street View cars captured personal data from Wi-Fi networks as well as taking pictures — since then regulators have imposed a series of fines — the largest being $7 million reportedly paid to settle a U.S. government probe."
I hate to admit it, but I kind of like Bing's various bird's-eye views. They offer plane-shots at around a 45-60 degree angle. And from all 4 major directions (N/S/E/W).
The quality is actually decent enough that, unless you're in a city with really tall buildings, you can make out the store fronts fairly well and see what the roads/turns are going to be like on your trip before-hand.
Sure, no-where near as good as high-quality as street view. But this way you have a view of ALL of the minor / small streets that Google's Street View hasn't taken yet. And I imagine this kind of thing is a lot quicker to do than Street View so it has the (potential) benefit of being more up-to-date and thus show a more accurate depiction of what the area looks like NOW vs a couple years ago.
Don't get me wrong, I LIKE street view. But for my region, the Bing bird's-eye view kind of works out better unless I'm looking at something on a major road.