Google Combining National Security Censorship And Blurry Satellite Maps

The Washington Post tells of how Google fixed a thorny situation with Google Maps satellite imagery. In June, Google added a collection of high resolution aerial photographs of Washington DC supplied by a government agency. The imagery looked great, but the government had edited out a bunch of areas considered terrorist targets, like The Mall, State Department, George Washington University, and other areas.
Google didn’t want large gaps, especially in areas likely to be searched by its users, so they came up with a good compromise: Wherever there was a censored location, they used the old imagery. Sure, 1/6th of DC is fuzzy, and some areas are out of date (demolished buildings raised from the dead, construction sites that are now finished buildings), but it’s better than no images at all.
I find it hilarious that the Washington Post uses as its expert a young “artistic” cartographer, who is […]

Original post by Nathan Weinberg