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Singapore gets Google Street View, finally

By Damian Koh, CNETAsia on December 2nd, 2009

Summary

Google's ground-level imagery feature called Street View, is at last a go in the island state.

Topics

360-degree, computer, google inc., google maps, new zealand, southeast asia, street view, taipei, taiwan, trike

Events

The 2nd InfoSecurity Summit HK 2010
17 Mar 2010

Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, Hong Kong

IT Architect Regional Conference Singapore 2010
20 - 21 Apr 2010

Singapore Management University, Singapore

The Internet Show 2010
21-22 Apr 2010

Suntec Singapore

A clarification was made to this story. Read below for details.

It's been a long wait, but Google's ground-level imagery feature Street View of Singapore is at last a go.

According to Google, Singapore is the first country in Southeast Asia to get Street View. The service is currently offered in Australia, Japan, New Zealand and Taiwan (Taipei city).

Screenshot of Esplanade Drive (Credit: Damian Koh)


Google Street View was first launched in five US cities back in May 2007. The service provides users with a 360-degree horizontal and 290-degree vertical panoramic street-level view on Google Maps.

In October last year, an eagle-eyed reader first alerted ZDNet Asia sister site, CNET Asia, to a silver Opel Astra sedan with mounted cameras and a Google logo at a junction between Dorset Road and Kampong Java Road.

When we asked Google when the service would be available on Google Maps Singapore, the search giant then replied vaguely "in the coming months".

Aside from collecting the street images of Singapore with a car, Google is also using a tricycle that resembles an ice cream cart to traverse areas not accessible by a motor vehicle, such as pedestrian pathways and bike trails. The Trike is used for the first time in Southeast Asia (and the second time in the Asia-Pacific region, after Japan) though the company didn't say how long the three-wheeled drive will be in Singapore or where it will go to next in Asia Pacific.

Since its launch, Street View has invited controversy over privacy issues in many countries.

To address this, Google uses a computer algorithm to prowl through its image data looking for faces and car license plates and then blurring them. The company added that the pictures users see on Street View can be a few months to a few years old, depending on the time lapsed between when the images were collected and processed. There are also tools for a user to request removal of pictures with inappropriate content.

Update: According to Google, Street View in Singapore currently doesn't include images collected by the Trike. These would be added to the service next year, along with a second round of driving with the Street View car.

Street View is accessible both on the desktop and on a mobile device as long as the latter has Google Maps for mobile installed. On an Android smartphone with a built-in compass, the onboard gyro sensor lets the user move the handset around to get different views of the street. The iPhone 3GS currently doesn't support this feature.

Clarification: Google earlier told us that Street View is available in Taiwan outside of Taipei city. The search giant has since clarified that Street View of Taipei is now available, while street view images are still being collected across Taiwan. The article has been updated to reflect this.



Related stories

Privacy group targets Google Street View UK

Group seeks blinders on Google Street View in Japan

S'pore: First Street View in Southeast Asia

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