SMX LoMo Keynote: Gur Kimchi
Gur Kimchi, Principle Architect for Microsoft’s Virtual Earth, also spoke Thursday morning at the SMX Local & Mobile conference in San Francisco.
Gur Kimchi, Principal Architect, Microsoft Virtual Earth
Gur provided a lot of demonstrations of existing and upcoming features from the Virtual Earth teams:
Popularity: 15% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 07/28/2008 | Permalink | 
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Filed under: Conferences, MSN Search, Research and DevelopmentLocal Search, Maps, MicroSoft, SMX LoMo, SMX-Local-&-Mobile, Virtual Earth
Where’s Waldo in Google Earth
In a very clever bit of marketing, Canadian artist Melanie Coles has created a large rooftop image of the iconic character found in the popular Where’s Waldo? book series.
The image is located somewhere in Vancouver, British Columbia, and was created with the specific intention of being findable via Google Earth (warning, I have the location pinpointed in a link and geocoordinates at the end of this post). It will be a while before Waldo can be found in Google Earth (or in Google Maps, Yahoo! Maps, or MS Live Search Maps, for that matter), because there is a time lag in between when satellite images and aerial photos get updated in those services — so, it could be six months to a year before the image is really findable and viewable online.
The image was created as a demonstration of a viral game for Coles’ graduation art project at the Emily Carr Institute. Her blog statement on the project says:
Popularity: 34% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 04/14/2008 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Google, Maps, Newsaerial-photos, Google-Earth, Google-Maps, Maps, Mapvertising, Roofvertising, Satellite-Images, Viral-Marketing, Where's Waldo
Google Puts News On The Map
Google has partnered with the New York Times to put news on the map — the NYT has apparently begun geotagging their news stories so that Google can associate news items with particular locations around the world. The Google Earth application can now be used to browse around a map of the world, and headlines are associated with their places of origin.
Newspapers have been very fearful of the internet and have lost revenue from their print side to free internet alternatives. But, it’s clear that embracing greater integration with interactive technologies is one viable way to remain competitive.
Popularity: 16% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 04/08/2008 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Google, Maps, NewsGoogle-Earth, Maps, New York Times, Newspapers
New Terrain Feature on Google Maps
The Google Operating System blog alerted us to how Google Maps quietly added a new “Terrain” button and removed the “Hybrid” button which combined Satellite and Map content. The official Google Lat Long blog reports that the “hybrid” feature can be accessed by clicking the Satellite button and the clicking on/off the “Show labels” box that appears in a dynamic drop-down.
The Terrain content can look pretty dynamic for mountain areas and other places with dramatic elevation contrasts like this area for the Grand Canyon:
I’m not sure just how valuable this is for the majority of users –
Popularity: 23% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 11/27/2007 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Google, Local Search, MapsGoogle-Maps, Maps, online-maps, Orienteering, Terrain
WikipediaVision Mashes Up With Google Maps and Wikipedia
An addictive little mashup called WikipediaVision has combined Google Maps with live data on updates from the English Wikipedia to display the geolocation of people editing articles in near real-time. The map rapidly pans back and forth across the world, pinpointing the locations of users who have just edited an article, and displaying the name of the article and its hyperlink.
It’s interesting and hypnotic to sit and watch where in the world
Popularity: 17% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 11/05/2007 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Maps, Research and Development, ToolsFlickrVision, Google-Maps, Maps, Mashups, Wikipedia, WikipediaVision
BlogMaps - Geographic Pinpoint Maps for Blogs
A few days ago, I noticed a BlogMap in the righthand column of Robert Scoble’s blog - I don’t see it there now, so perhaps he was just experimenting with it. But, the Blogmap immediately appealed to me as a cool mashup concept, and a nice enhancement for locally-oriented blogs.
If you operate a blog that’s about a specific geographic location, I think addition of a Blog Map to your layout could be a great feature. The BlogMap shows a small map image which has your blog pinpointed on it, and a link to all the other local blogs in your area.
If you use this, I suggest you be careful about using your home address for the map pinpoint, since this could introduce negative factors, personal security-wise. Instead, use a nearby address, or use your work address.
It took me about one minute to set up this BlogMap for Natural Search Blog:
If you operate a blog that is about your local area, I also suggest using the hCard Microformat in your site design in order to best optimize for local search engines, though blog search engines likely haven’t set up special algorithms for locality specification yet. I previously blogged about how to use microformats to optimize for local search.
Another option BlogMaps offers is to just display a button that displays the number of Bloggers nearby, hyperlinked to a list of them - something you could use if your were concerned about displaying your location. They also offer a button for “your local opml”.
The Blogmap interface is very elegantly done - simple, and easy-to-use. No surprise that this was developed by one of the primary Microsoft Virtual Earth developers, Chandu Thota. Chandu just recently left Microsoft, and I’d bet they’ll miss him.
One suggestion to Chandu: it’d be really cool if you offered the option for bloggers to display the larger map that pinpoints all the top bloggers in your mapped area. I know he may’ve avoided doing this because of the cost of the maps that would need to be delivered. The way around this might be to offer this add-on service for users who wish to pay a subscription fee.
Popularity: 9% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 02/16/2007 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Blog Optimization, Local Search Optimization, MapsBlog Optimization, Blogmaps, Local Search Optimization, Maps
Could Newspapers Own Local Search Through Better SEO?
Don Dodge, Director of BizDev for Microsoft’s Emerging Business Team, just wrote an article on how “Newspapers should own local search results“. I wasn’t entirely sure from his column if he meant they “should” own local as in “they are traditional experts at local info, and therefore should own local search due so it’s surprising they don’t”, or if he meant that “they should own local because I think they’re the ideal owners of it.” I think he meant that it’s just surprising they aren’t bigger contenders in local search, and if that’s what he was driving at — I tend to agree.
I also think he’s right — they don’t own local search in great part because they don’t think globally and they are crappy at the SEO side of the game. But, I’d go so far as to say that they should NOT think they can own local anymore — that kind of mindset is just what’s hampering them now. Yeah, they’d be better off if they improved their SEO, but that’s just going to be a bandaid for them at this point.
Popularity: 3% [?]
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Posted by Chris Silver Smith of Netconcepts on 01/16/2007 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Local Search Optimization, SEO, Search Engine Optimization, Yellow PagesLocal Search, Newspapers, SEO, Yellow Pages
Google Maps
Geez, I just posted an amalgamation of Google news, then a day later they launch another new service — Google Maps. I can’t seem to keep up with all the cool stuff that Google Labs pumps out. I love the way you can pan around by clicking and dragging with the mouse. Check it out!
Popularity: 4% [?]
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Posted by Stephan Spencer of Netconcepts on 02/08/2005 | Permalink | Email
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Filed under: Google, Local Search, MapsGoogle, Google-Maps, Local Search, Maps
