Filed under: Etc.
Smile! Car accident photographed by Google Street View
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We haven't actually found a proper use yet for Google Street View, the Google Maps' function that lets you drag an avatar around a Google Map and get an on-the-street 360-degree view of the location. So far we've used it to spot a really fugly Buick, and that's about it. Not many of us live in locales that have already been mapped by a battalion of Google Street View cars, though.
It turns out our friends over at Jalopnik haven't found a good use for the technology yet, either. Like us, they're more interested in the weird auto-related stuff that Google Street View cars happen to capture while cruising by. In this instance, a poor woman's bad day in which she slammed her Mercedes-Benz into a tree has forever been immortalized by the indomitable search engine. Fortunately, the tow truck driver can use Google Maps to find her car. Unfortunately, her insurance agent can use the Street View pics as evidence of her inability to drive.
[Source: Jalopnik]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Kiiks 2:29PM (1/04/2008)
Whoops.
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John R 2:29PM (1/04/2008)
LOL. I love google.
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Mark 4:07PM (1/04/2008)
agreed!
Jason 2:33PM (1/04/2008)
Just so everyone knows, I went ahead and clicked on the Help link, so nobody needs to call 911 or anything. Google is awesome!
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Corey L 6:34PM (1/04/2008)
+1! I lol'ed
Benfolio 2:42PM (1/04/2008)
I can't wait till they try to get through a ghetto like that around Milwaukee. Google's gonna be missing a camera car or two.
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Jay 2:57PM (1/04/2008)
Wow, just when you think you've been owned, life owns you even more.
So I guess I don't need to post about this on AF :)
Benfolio 3:02PM (1/04/2008)
No, you don't. Keep your filthy Autoblog links to yourself.
BTW that bridge that fell in the river oh so long ago? Standing as of Google's pic taking expedition.
Mulad 2:49PM (1/04/2008)
If you zoom out and then click the forward arrow, you can drive past the car and see the ladies behind it getting stuff out of the trunk. Hah, funny, it's in Minneapolis. I was thinking it looked a lot like the city :-p
Of course the other big thing with Google Street View in Minneapolis is that they were taking pictures right around the time of the I-35W bridge collapse. They have some imagery from on the bridge within a few days before the collapse, but if you navigate north to the cross street of University Avenue and look south, the bridge is gone and there's a lot of police and media presence.
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riDuh7 3:06PM (1/04/2008)
Priceless.
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Jim in Tampa 3:27PM (1/04/2008)
Ohhhhhhhhhhhh, how sad.
Now if I can stop laughing . . . .
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Xcountryflyer 3:37PM (1/04/2008)
I hope she didn't hurt a squirrel!
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500 4:11PM (1/04/2008)
Looks like a robbery in progress. Also, I love how much more "colorful" the comments are on Jalopnik. Apparently they aren't such Nazi's about removing comments as, ahem, some blogs I know...
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Travis Rassat 6:16PM (1/04/2008)
If you've got some spare time on your hands, here's a website dedicated to all sorts of funny things that can be seen in Street View:
http://www.streetviewfun.com/
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DAMurphy 10:00AM (1/05/2008)
No Accident.
They were filming the remake to It's a Wonderful Life. Snow to be digitally added in post production.
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