An anniversary arrives as Google capitulates to a silly geographical request by a government.
The world has changed a lot in 20 years: phones today look totally different from what they did back then, and so does how you get around. Mobile devices didn’t quite have the smarts they do now, and Google would only be a 10 year company predominantly focused on search, with the first version of Android still three years away in 2008.
It doesn’t seem all that long ago that Google celebrated 15 years of Google Maps. My, how time changes.
But twenty years ago, Google did release something from developers working in Australia, as Google Maps came to life, born in Australia under another startup, Where 2 Technologies.
The technology was small then, but has grown massively in the years since, rolling out to provide a way for millions to make their way from point A to points B, C, and through to Z, while also being used to check petrol prices, check air quality, track bushfires, and even be used as a way to track traffic changes regularly.
Maps was also the place where Street View kicked off, initially starting as a university project before being rolled into Google Maps in 2007, two years after Maps did. Street View provides a first-person approach to mapping directions thanks to specialised vehicles that capture roads and routes and buildings all over the world, and was later used to help people explore art galleries, Sydney ferries, Gallipoli, and even space.
Google notes that Maps provides locations for 250 million businesses and places on its maps, that 500 million people contribute reviews and photos each year, and that a staggering one trillion kilometres of directions were provided last year alone.
A testament to the power of its users, Google has assembled some of the most famed places in Australia, such as the most reviewed fish and chips shop being Charis Seafoods in Labrador, Queensland, racking up over 5,000 reviews, or the most reviewed Aussie ice cream shop being Cow & The Moon in Enmore, NSW with over 3,000 reviews.
Thousands upon thousands of reviews have been left across Australian landmarks, helping people get around and find the best places to eat, visit, and generally just find a nice park, with Kings Park in Perth edging out Sydney’s Hyde Park, in case you’re curious, just ahead of Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary in Queensland. More of those places can be found at a list on Google celebrating the anniversary.
And as Google Maps turns 20, you have to wonder where it will go next, beyond merely surrendering geographical map names to a government intent on changing them.
Barely a month into the new US government and its sweeping changes, Google joins the many companies seemingly responding to the departmental shifts by changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico, even when it has been the “Gulf of Mexico” for hundreds of years.
Here in Australia, locals will see both names, with the new name sitting in parentheses below the proper name, which knowing how politics works will likely change if or when a new administration enters the fray in a few years time.
Google Maps will likely continue to provide useful mapping data, of course, though we hope the name changes actually respect what islands and bodies of water have been called for ages. Otherwise, Google can get to letting us all name countries with our own pet names, and things can just get straight up silly.
