Blog Archive

Monday, January 30, 2006

Google Maps Mashup: The Web 2.0 Innovation Map



Ryan Williams has put together a great new Google Maps mashup called "The Web 2.0 Innovation Map". The map plots 200 Web 2.0 applications such as Wikipedia and Bloglines. Using WHOIS data and contact information from the sites it then gets fed through the Yahoo! Geocoder API. In Ryan's words "It's an interesting way to chronicle how Web 2.0 development is distributed geographically." It does just that. The map gives you a greater appreciation for the fact that there are many web 2.0 properties in Canada as well as the U.S.

Micro Persuasion pointed me to a great article in the San Francisco Chronicle today that gives a good Web 2.0 "101" for those of you looking to learn more about the craze/hype/rising tide. :)

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4 New U.S. Google Maps Mashups: Road Trips, Comic Shops, Coffee, Home Heating

RoadsideAmerica.com adds Google Maps - RoadSideAmerica describes itself as "Your Online Guide to Offbeat Tourist Attractions" and it's now plotting those offbeat points on a Google Map for you. Enter the city you're traveling through to get information for hotels, visitor tips and interesting facts about various attractions.
[via]
Directory of U.S. Home Heating Oil Providers & Prices - Locate regional home fuel suppliers and benefit from others having shared the recent price they paid at those suppliers.

Find a Comic Book Shop - This Google Maps mashup is just getting started but already has locations for many shops. Includes locations for Canada and Europe.

The Hub of the Coffee Universe - Adam Gaffin of Google Maps mashups Boston Eats and Boston 24 reveals where the hub of the Boston coffee universe is located with this Google Map.


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Sunday, January 29, 2006

Google Maps API + World Of WarCraft = MapWow.com

API +
=

MapWow.com is a new web-based mapping site that features a map of the World of WarCraft universe, a popular multi-player online game. The cool part about is that it uses the Google Maps API to create an end user experience that matches Google Maps. You can filter the map to view herb, ore, treasure, and location label viewing but as of the time of this posting, the site notes that increased traffic from Digg (1529 diggs so far!) has forced them to disable these features temporarily (see caption). There is an open call for donations to help them pay their hosting fees so they can re-enable this.

It's great to see Google Maps becoming the defacto standard web-mapping interface for both the real and fantasy world! :)

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Saturday, January 28, 2006

Google Maps Creation Tools and Resources

Looking for Google Maps Mashups? Scroll down to earlier posts or check here

Google Maps Creation Tools:

Web Tools that use Google Maps:
Applications that are now using Google Maps:
Related to the Google Maps API:
Other related sections here on Google Maps Mania:

Friday, January 27, 2006

New Google Maps Mashups: Weather, SF, NYC trash

Google Maps + Weather.com U.S. National Weather Map [via]

Wayfaring.com Map: Historical San Francisco

Wayfaring.com: Hills of San Francisco

GarbageScout.com - Find stuff in NYC trash [via The Gothamist]


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Thursday, January 26, 2006

Find Beer and Wine with these new Google Maps mashups!

New U.S. Beer Map shows tons of beer related locations - Here is a new beer map for the United States that shows Breweries, Homebrew Clubs, Brew on Premise, Brewpubs, Micro Breweries, Contract Breweries, Beer Stores, Homebrew Stores and Beer Bars! Woah! That's a lot of beer! I feel tipsy just browsing this map! This awesome Google Map allows for additional map markers that can be added by it's users.

Wingeeks.com add Google Maps for major wine regions - Winegeeks.com, with over 700 wineries to their database, and has created Google Maps for each of the major wine regions in the United States (smaller regions will be rolled out this spring). Here are some examples: Willamette Valley, Finger Lakes and Napa Valley - Check here for more regions and more info about the maps here.

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Google Maps news and blog post roundup

What's fuelling the appeal of Google Earth?
Travolution - Jan.25/06
Using Google for Profit: Data Point
AllPointsBlog - Jan.24/05
Google Earth Growth - What's Behind it?
HitWise Blog - Jan.24/06
Google Maps is the #3 return on a Google search for "maps"
SeanBonner.com - Jan.23/06
Terrific Real Estate Search Tools
SearchEngineWatch.com - Jan.23/06
O'Reilly: "Google Maps is the new open source."
AllPointsBlog - Jan.22/06
Google eye in the sky catches flying car
Sploid.com - Jan.23/06
Tour New York with a Google-Wikipedia-GPS mashup
C|Net Google Blog - Jan.18/06
Still Seeing "Blue Pins" on Some Google Maps; Google Now Testing Paid Links in Google Earth
Search Engine Watch - Jan.18/06
Hot: Real Estate Industry Uses of Satellite/Aerial Imagery
Search Engine Watch - Jan.17/06
Search engines going far beyond maps
SeattlePi.com - Jan.15/06
A Better Way to Do the Monster Mash
Baseline - Jan.14/06
Want Google Local to Look/Act Like Live Local?
AllPointsBlog - Jan.9/06
Google Maps and your alumni!
Wired Communities - Jan.9/06
[Book Review] Google Maps API: Adding 'Where' to Your Applications
The Farm Tucows Blog - Jan.5/06
Update on Mashup Camp
ZDNet Blogs - Jan.4/06
Man Hacks The Internet To Plot Amazon Wishlists Users Home Addresses on Google Maps
Pay Attention To Me! - Jan.4/06
"My New Business Card", Google maps based
Will.Boerland.com - Jan.3/06
Cheney's Residence and Google Maps
HouseofLabor - Jan.2/06

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

New Google Maps Mashups for Canada: Libraries, Golf Courses, Toronto Housing and Live Music

Finding Libraries in Canada - Looking for your local library? If all goes well, each of them local to you should be plotted when you visit Libraries411.com. If not, you can open up a nifty web panel feature that lets you plug in your Canadian postal code and.. VOILA - Your local libraries are displayed on the map! This is a very cool use of Google Maps and publicly accessible data! This mashup also works for the U.S. (Note: This mashup defaults to the Yahoo! Maps version - click "Switch to Google Maps" to change views.)

Finding Golf Courses in Ontario - If you're like thousands of golfers in Ontario, you're looking outside and wondering when winter will give way to spring and yet another golf season. To plot your attack for 2006, check out this great mashup that has been created by Golf-Courses.ca that lets you search for a golf course by provincial region or city. Results get displayed on a Google Map. This is a great tool for residents of or visitors to Ontario!

Toronto Real Estate Map + TTC + Beer Stores + LCBO shops - MoveMap.com is a VERY cool apartment search for the City of Toronto. It lets you search apartment listings by typical filters such as bedrooms, rent-range etc. Interested in knowing the proximity of your results to things like The Beer Store or an LCBO shop? How about the closest Subway Station? No problem. Map pins indicate this with "B" and "L" pins, as well as the TTC logo among your apartment listings which are marked as "A" on the Google Map.. Pretty cool, "A"?! :)

Find Live Music Venues in Toronto - TorontoLiveClubHub.com has a great little Google Map of the venues in the city that feature live music. Links in the info-balloons help you find out what gigs you can catch at these locations..


More Google Maps Mashups for Canada can be found here and here.. Do you know of more? Post a comment to this blog-post to let others know!

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Google Maps Flight Tracker

GMaps Flight Tracker.com is a new Google Maps mashup that shows inbound flight maps to some busy U.S. airports: Atlanta, Boston, JFK New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. The mashup uses data from FBOWeb.com. Upon selecting your city, choose from a list of all inbound flights. The Map plots the flight with a unique airplane marker showing additional data like altitude and speed.

If you're looking for a specific flight remember you can always plug the flight number into a Google search (Try UAL 11 as an example), then choose to track status on FBOWeb.com for a small Google Map (or link for Google Earth) showing its present position. Check this previous post for more information.

Other "Air" Mashups and Resources:

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Monday, January 23, 2006

Google announces improved imagery for Google Maps!

The Official Google Blog contains a very interesting post that describes some upgrades that should get all Google Maps buffs excited - improved zoom levels and imagery that matches with Google Earth! Here is an excerpt:

"..We're always trying to improve the imagery in Google Earth and Google Local, but our latest update is bigger than usual. Not only have we added extensive 6-inch imagery for many parts of the U.K., but we've updated the Google Local database to match the coverage we have in Google Earth, and (drum roll, please) ... we've added two more zoom levels in Google Local's Satellite mode! Now for many areas around the world you can see a lot more detail than you could before. (read the entire post)

Note: This change does not seem to have affected API sites or "mashups" (Thanks to Tagzania) Be sure to check my list of "Collections" sites that organize links to Google Maps
satellite views for you.

Have fun rediscovering Google Maps!

(Special thanks to Kevin Fitzpatrick and James Turnbull (Google Sightseeing) for tipping me off on this news!)

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Hey, 24 fans: Check out the JackTracker Google Maps Mashup!


The Jack-Tracker!

GridSkipper has the scoop on a HOT new Web 2.0 mashup that combines Google Maps and Wayfaring with Flickr and YouTube to bring you a way to keep current with one of the best television shows going: 24. Wayfaring.com user Bohan has used the Do-It-Yourself Google Maps web app to create "JackTracker", a Google Maps and Wayfaring powered show tracker that lets you see, on a Google Map what world locations the show is weaving viewers through. "Waypoints" or map pins give you show notes, and screen captures from each episode. The site design behind Wayfaring helps to create a forum/message board for each waypoint as well, so show fans can chat about the event in the show or the actual location that it took place in! What an awesome marriage of some great new web technologies and traditional television... Why didn't Fox think of this? If I were a big-wig television exec, I'd be making an offer and getting Bohan on the payroll. :) If I were the producer of The Amazing Race series, I'd be making sure that my show website had something similar to what has been done here for the next season also!
[via]

Saturday, January 21, 2006

Caribbean Islands Google Maps mashups

If you're one of the thousands of North Americans or Europeans escaping the grips of winter in the northern hemisphere this year, the Caribbean Islands may well be your destination. The good folks over at IslandTips.com have tried to help your online research experience easier and more visual using the Google Maps API. They have created a series of map views and overlays for popular Caribbean Island destinations:
These maps will help you search for things to do on the island and perhaps will help prepare you to seek out day-tours from the operators once you arrive (There are even Flickr photo streams along the bottom!) For others that aren't actually traveling to these sunny destinations, these maps act as an interesting tour of these island countries.

[via]
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North American Bird Watching Google Maps Mashup

GeoBirds.com + Google Maps - The folks at GeoBirds.com have created an amazing Google Maps mashup that makes use of Flash and Google Maps to show you a fascinating bird map of the US and Canada. They have mashed together bird range data from the US Geological Service's annual breeding bird survey and the Audubon Society's annual Christmas bird count to bring North American birders a suite of map-based tools including:

1. An identification tool that narrows likely birds by proximity to your location
2. Interactive and explorable range maps
3. An identification game allowing birders to practice identifying birds
from their area
4. Functionality for posting and viewing your own bird sightings

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Friday, January 20, 2006

Canadian Election Google Maps Mashups

Canadians go to the polls this Monday, January 23rd in a rare mid-winter federal election. To encourage people to vote and build some interest around the election the Google Maps API has been used by Chris Nolan to create The Canadian Election 2006 Mashup. It mashes up with his unique polling website "Kweschun.com". From the map's page: "Each point on the map is a riding. Click the point to see more details about that riding, including links to give your opinion on who you'd like to win, and who you think will win that riding. The colours of the points indicate what party is currently ahead, according to your opinions (white means no one answered for that riding yet). Click to show the colours based on 'Would Like to' win". (At time of posting some of the site's functionality was to be fixed: postal code lookup and a few links on the page need to be corrected.)

Another previously mentioned Canadian Election mashup is here: Pollstr.ca - This mashup aggregates poll data from SES CPAC, Strategic, Ekos and Decima

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Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Google Map of 2000 pubs in London, England

+ = PintSearch.com

Looking for a pub in London? Are you looking for a MAP of pubs in London? Good, because I've found an awesome Google Maps mashup for you that lists 2000 pubs for this great city - PintSearch.com. It shows pubs according to rating (using the hot or not scale), pubs by postcode and pubs close to tube stations. This mashup is good for the Londoner, good for the tourist, good for everyone. Why? Because everyone should have a pint in London at least once in their life.

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4 Google Maps UK Mashups: School Finder, Brighton, UK Info

UK School Map - Here is a new Google Maps mashup of all local UK schools. The map can be searched either by browsing a Google Map of UK, or by postcode. Search filtering includes distance or performance score and school type (nursery, primary, secondary, etc..). The schools list has links to school inspection results, and school performance tables for that school.


UK Info Map is now fixed
- The UK Info Map has undergone repairs. It is back to bring you All London Underground Stations, BBC Travel News, Weatherpixies info, Flickr photos, UK points of interest, London web cams, GeoURL local web sites and UK Gatso speed cameras.. all on.. what else? -> A Google Map! :) Be sure to zoom in far enough so map pins are displayed for some of the data (such as the Tube Map). This is seriously a must-visit for anyone in the UK and other Google Maps mashup enthusiasts. It's a monster-mashup of so much information!


Other Maps:
Brighton Wifi Locations
Brighton Filming Locations

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5 new U.S. Google Maps mashups: NYC beer/music, peaks, Youthworks

New York City: Good music and 1 great beer - Crooked-Beat.com has created a nifty little Google Map for New York City folks looking for some live music. Map-search options allow you to sort the locations based on the venue having lots of great beers with some even hard to find, straight down to "at least 1 great beer"! :) Good fun.


U.S. High Point Explorer Map - This Google Map allows you to view highpoints for the United States as a whole or states individually. For the US, there are several specific views. For states, you can view by highpoints or by county. In addition, there is a unique view called 'Regional', which allows you to view the top 50 highpoints in the current map window. You can zoom in or out and refresh the regional list. Peaks are also listed in a handy interactive sidebar, which you can click on to view the peak on the map.


Youthworks Reservation Site Map
- Youthworks.com has put a lot of thought and effort into the user interface of this Google Maps mashup with locations of their site reservation locations across North America - I especially like the zoom tool they've employed here. There is a detailed case study on this map creation here.


Other Maps:
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Tuesday, January 17, 2006

3 new U.S. Google Maps mashups: Bay Area Tech, Hockey, Oregon

San Francisco Bay Area Tech Companies - Blogger MadDogFog has made use of the DIY Google Maps creator Wayfaring.com to create a Google Map of Tech Companies in the Bay Area. The map includes locations of companies like Technorati, Six Apart and Bloglines and even allows you to add locations of tech companies that you know of. MadDogFog has even integrated the map (which you can navigate) into this blog post on Blogger! Clicking anywhere on the map in the post brings you to this Wayfaring URL that allows you to explore the map further.


U.S. National Hockey Rink Map - Here is another unique Google Maps mashup that has been facilitated by another DIY (do-it-yourself) Google Maps creator: MapBuilder.net HockeyCat.com is busy Google Mapping all the ice hockey rinks in the U.S. It has started in the Mid-Atlantic and is slowly moving across the Mid-West now. Check out this blog for all the details of their mission. A great use of MapBuilder and a very useful Google Map!


Oregon's bounty on a Google Map - Here is a Google Maps mashup produced by TravelOregon.com. They have blended together old style cartographic maps to let you narrow down the area of Oregon you are looking to visit then a Google Map is displayed for to show you where various wineries, restaurants and bed and breakfasts are located.


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Monday, January 16, 2006

English Google Map of Shops/Restaurants in Tokyo & Kansai Japan

If you find yourself in Tokyo or the Kansai region of Japan anytime soon, you might find this Google Maps mashup useful. It is a mashup of the bilingual food guide Bento.com that contains restaurant listings for these two areas of Japan. The maps lists all kinds of places: Beer bars, Brewpubs and Retail, Late-night spots, No-Smoking, Sake pubs and Retail, Take-out and bakeries, Sandwich shops and Delis, and Vegetarian locations within Tokyo and the Kansai area (Osaka, Kobe). Most map locations have photos and all have links to English language directions and reviews.
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Google Maps Blog Buzz - Blackberry, Google Maps Ads, DIY

There are some Google Maps stories and links getting more play than usual around the blogosphere this past week. In case you've missed them, here they are:

+ :
The RIM Blackberry device is now capable of running the Google Local for Mobile application. This means that Blackberry users around the world can point their device to a URL to perform an over-the-air installation of the free application and start using Google Maps instantly! When Google Local for Mobile was first launched, the Blackberry was excluded from the list of devices that could run the service. As a Blackberry owner I was quite happy when this came out, and installed it minutes after seeing the release. With nearly a week of using the application on my Blackberry.. I'm hooked. :) Great! Now, not only am I addicted to my "CrackBerry", I'm also now addicted to Google Maps on my CrackBerry!

Google Local removes ad-pin test - Search Engine Watch has made us aware of an article on Clickz that points to Google quietly testing paid ads in Google Local. The ads come in the form of a blue pin being inserted into the map among larger pins which match with your local search. The example cited in the Clickz article is of a New York hotel search that visibly shows the blue pins of premium AdWords advertiser Starwood Hotels. Google has removed this inclusion since Clickz first reported on it last week. This is the first indication I've seen of Google attempting to monetize Google Local/Google Maps. It could potentially lead to the integration of advertising on Google Maps API sites or "mashups", although there has been no announcement of this.

Add a Google Map to any webpage in less than 10 minutes - This blog post caught the attention of the blogosphere last week, and why wouldn't it? A claim like that would capture the attention of anyone interesting in embedding a Google Map for their website or blog. If you're looking for more resources to create your own Google Maps implementation or mashup, check my Google Maps Creation Tools/How-Tos section or Mapki.com.

Saturday, January 14, 2006

Google Maps mashups at sea: News, Diving, Wrecks

Not all mashups show locations on land. Here are some "at-sea" Google Maps mashups:

Global Ocean News Map - The Ocean Channel has made use of DIY Google Maps creator Mapbuilder.net to create the Global Ocean News Map. The news-map aggregates ocean-themed stories and places the stories on the map where they are taking place with a nifty little "O"-cean icon! :)


World Dive Atlas - WannaDive.net is a site that allows you to post and read about world dive sites. It has begun to integrate Google Maps throughout the site. A Google Map is now displayed on many of the featured dive sites, and the Zones and Countries section has overlays of various dive sites within that region.

[via]

Shipwreck Map - This Google Map mashes up with the shipwreck database published by the NOAA. The info-balloons shows you the wreck name, depth, date and latitude and longitude of the shipwreck. Search the database if you're trying to locate a specific wreck.


Submarine Wreck Map - From the same site that has produced the Shipwreck Map, this map helps you locate sub-wrecks within a certain radius. Center the map using the circular target, then search for the nationality of the wreck.

Here some other previously mentioned Google Maps mashups that plot locations over water:

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