Google Street View – Ottawa
Posted on March 25, 2009 by Patrick
Filed Under Google, Interactive Tools, Resources, Web 2.0 tools
Google Street View is a popular feature in Google Maps and Google Earth that allows users to view panoramic pictures taken from street level of many cities in the United State, Europe and parts of Asia.
A great example of Street View is its use in Washington DC. Using it you can walk/drive the streets of the US capital and explore the exterior architecture of monuments, landscaping as get a scope of the city.
Google just recently announced plans to expand the feature to Canadian cities, including Ottawa.
Privacy groups have concerns with Google Street View as images of people are often included, occasionally in unflattering or compromising situations. Google is addressing some of these concerns by removing pictures (by request) and by blurring faces and license plates of cars.
So how could Google Street View can be used in teaching and learning? Some ideas:
1) It could be used as part of an assignment; i.e. travel to a city and create a virtual field trip for classmates.
2) It can be used to build community; particularly when teaching a class with new Canadians and/or ESL learners i.e. encourage students to send you a link to the street view of their community, favorite restaurant, or have them show their community/home town in class.
3) A source for learning about city planning, landscaping, spatial relationships, and architecture.
4) Foster a discussion on privacy. Should Google be allow to do what it is doing? What are the concerns?
5) Use it to foster discussions around social issues and equity i.e. Locations for low income housing in relation to city services.
6) Tour historical areas, i.e. walk the hot spots of the French revolution in Paris.
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4 Responses to “Google Street View – Ottawa”
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Although there are many positive benefits, much like there are positive benefits to sitting in front of peoples homes and photographing them.
Here are the benefits to sitting in front of YOUR home and photographing you and your activities:
1) It could be used as part of an assignment; i.e. travel to a home and create a virtual field trip for classmates.
2) It can be used to build community; particularly when teaching a class with new Canadians and/or ESL learners i.e. encourage students to send you a link to the home view of their inhabitants, favorite people and homes, or have them show their home and neighbourhood in class.
3) A source for learning about city planning, landscaping, spatial relationships, and architecture, as well as local residents, demographics and more!
4) Foster a discussion on privacy. Should Google be allow to do what it is doing? What are the concerns?
5) Use it to foster discussions around social issues and equity i.e. Locations for low income housing in relation to city services.
Foster discussion around family issues and the activities they are a part of at home.
6) Tour historical areas, i.e. walk the old traditional buildings and compare how families and people live in them compared to how people lived before.
It looks pretty much the same doesn’t it? Yet why would you feel offended if someone sat outside of your home or merely passed by and took pictures of you, your home, your family and activities?
The issue is that consent was not obtained, and as I understand it — this is illegal in Canada.
Why is Google allowed to follow through with this illegal activities before the issues surrounding Street View can be addressed?
Firstly, they say that they have an “opt-out” request to remove images. However this is not enough, this just means more work for people to stay private and the damage may have already been done. Why should I expend my energy on this?
Secondly, Blurring images is after-the-fact. Canadian privacy law disallows the collection of personally identifiable information — just because a corporation “promises” to blur it does not explain the fact that they are illegal collecting your image in the first place.
I strongly encourage everyone that is offended by this prying into our private lives to write to Google, your local government, MP, and Ottawa.
Jim wrote:
“The issue is that consent was not obtained, and as I understand it — this is illegal in Canada.”
Actually, they are not taking photos of “you” as the subject, but the area. Thus, they are not breaking any laws. If that were the case, then everytime you take a picture of a family member (with consent) in a public place and catch someone else in the shot, you’d be breaking the law. Which you are not.
The way that they do this is to have people drive special cars with special cameras to take photos of the city. I, for one, do not object to this and actually welcome it. If they catch me in the shot, great. If not, oh well.
It is not like someone can seach google street view for you. Good luck with that one.
Bottom line. Not illegal, good idea and hope Ottawa is done soon (and google, don’t forget Kanata!).
I feel this is a major value added service, and Google has been working very closely with the CRTC and Privacy commissioner to ensure that privacy requirements are met.
This is why streetview hasn’t been released in Canada, they are still trying to find the optimal way to satisfy privacy concerns like yours while allowing Canadians to experience the wonderful ability to virtually browse our many unique communities.
Hello
A nice post on how Google Street View can be used in education and ESL.
You may like to take a look at the following page exactly about using Street View in language learning.
http://www.avatarlanguages.com/teaching/streetview.php
I see a lot of opportunities for student centered learning with tools such as this.
Howard