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Our GIS department had airphoto and street view on web based arcgis when google rolled out maps. So did our neighbouring cities, with a central site trying to l
by moksly 6y ago
Our GIS department had airphoto and street view on web based arcgis when google rolled out maps. So did our neighbouring cities, with a central site trying to link it all together.
They also had, maybe, 10 users outside of our own network a year. Everyone else we’re using the traditional pre-google-maps map websites, in my country krak.dk.
I think what google did better was marketing. Then they mapped every WiFi network on the planet to make real life location tracking faster than using GPS.
- nl 6y agoIt's true GIS departments did have some access to LandSat grade access via ArcGIS. But it wasn't useful to anyone who wasn't in the GIS/remote sensingspace. Firstly, the ArcGIS product was primarily client/server and secondly you had to understand what you wanted to see before you used it - it was (and is) literally as easy to get infra red satellite imagery as actual photos. That's not just marketing - it made it usable for whole new markets.
- rapsey 6y ago> I think what google did better was marketing. What google did was make it into a mass product and they had the resources to apply it to a planet level. That is more than marketing. There are a whole lot of steps between tech demo/proof of concept to product. The most important of which is to actually have the foresight of what the product can be and a plan to get there.
- thatoneguy 6y agoThe hybrid location tracking technology was actually invented by another company that later sued Google: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyhook_Wireless https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyhook_Wireless