Google has just announced that it will be bringing its ” Street View” images to Australia with images captured over the next several months and become available for viewing later this year.
Google Street View is an added feature of their highly popular Google Maps that provides 360° panoramic views of the street at ground level. It was launched in May this year in the US for a limited number of cities which has been slowly expanded.
The images are taken by specially modified cars that take the images from a rooftop mounted camera and record the location of each photos by GPS. When taking millions of images at street level of a city you are bound to catch some amazing things and there are many websites that have sprung up to highlight some of the best images and one of the best is Google Street View Sightings. Google has caught abortion protests, break and enters and people in compromising positions. Australian privacy laws are a little more strict than the US and it is expected that Google will have to blur the faces and car number plates of anyone photographed.
Google Street View allows a lot of possibilities for real estate agents. In the US some agents are providing a link direct to the street view of a property on their website so potential buyers can get a feel for the neighbourhood.