Google saw someone’s cat – and so it begins. Earlier this week, the search engine giant released Street View, a Google Maps feature that allows users to see things from the perspective of a person driving down a public road. Now privacy concerns are beginning to mount.
These concerns have, as Robert Scoble points out, no legal basis whatsoever: “In the United States, if you can see something from a public street you are allowed to take pictures of it,” he states.
Yet you can’t say that Street View isn’t (in addition to being very cool) just the tiniest bit creepy. After all, while walking around your house in your bathrobe, you expect to, at worst, make yourself visible to a neighbor or a deliveryman – not everyone with access to the Internet.
In the case that started this soon-to-be uproar, it was fortunately a cat, not a person, who was too near an open window. Boing Boing’s Xeni Jardin links to the picture, then writes, “Dang, it’s so detailed, I can even see he’s a tabby!”
Now, as mentioned earlier, Robert Scoble is weighing in. CNET’s Daniel Terdiman is creating a Street View photo album of sorts. And mydigimedia’s Amy Webb is reporting a rumor “that very soon, there will be a video option with either live shots or feeds from YouTube.” Yikes.
So, Street View: yea or nay? Google’s doing nothing illegal, but if you don’t like it, the company may just listen up and install some sort of privacy option or feature.
