Google maps

[texanjoker]

If you want, there is a way to report issues of your home with Google maps. I looked up my house and liked how my cars were also shown. Sure they blur the license plate, but give me a break.

http://www.offthegridnews.com/2013/10/3 ... ogle-maps/

[WildBill]

Interesting post. Thanks for the link.

[ChoqPOC]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

[G26ster]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

[jmra]

They haven't made it out to me yet, but the overhead view has been updated recently. So much for privacy fences.
I keep both cars in the garage - the only time they are not in the garage is if we aren't home.

From a security standpoint, I have a monitored alarm system with motion activated cameras - I get notified via text with a link to the recorded video whenever someone gets within 15 feet of the house.

[C-dub]

I've heard rumors that my city is using this to check for code violations. Checking for things like sheds or hot tubs and cross referencing whatever they find with building permits.

There are no vehicles in my driveway in the overhead pictures of my house, but my truck is there in the street view. The picture appears to be about 3 years old.

[jimlongley]

The street view pic of my house is the same in both Google Maps and Google Earth, from 09/2012, and at the moment both of the aerial views are the same. My neighbor's house is blurred out in street view, but really can't imagine why.

I have had fun checking back on a couple of houses that I owned in the past, it took the next owner of my first house 20 plus years to paint the little porch roof that I didn't do when I painted the house in 1985. The second owner of another of my previous homes let the beautiful little flowering crab apple tree that some of my late wife's ashes were deposited under go and actually be overgrown by some kind of weedy vine. And the current owner of the house we lived in in IL has had to repair the roof.

When I was engineering the wireless network for the red light cameras in Dallas, we were "partnering" with the vendor supplying the wireless equipment, and they cheerfully offered the services of one of their "Graphic Information Specialists" to supply us with route maps and path analyses that he would do in Google Earth (this was in 2006 and GE has improved since then) I went to his office, and we had some geeky fun together, but he was not doing the paths correctly so I continued to do them myself with topo maps (including Delorme's 3D Topo Quads.)

I'm not real worried about the "spying" aspect of GE and GM, as they are not real time and I can prove that they are prone to error (millions of pics are done in a mosaic and "knitted" together with disparities based on camera angle and light) but I get a kick out of the fact that in them you can see the groove that my dogs have worn in the back yard, from the doggie door to the bird feeder, and in one of the old pics you can see my neighbor and I in the back alley chatting.

[ddstuder]

I did not care when they showed the front of the house. Anyone driving down the street can see this.

My problem is that they have now gone down my alley!

You can clearly see over all of the fences and into the back yards of all my neighbors! I believe they should not do this!

[ChoqPOC]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

The images are routinley updated, based on my experience. Likely because I live in an area that has had and continues to have significant development. I've lived here since 2005, but my house has been updated at least once every six months since I've been checking Google Maps. Last update, May 2013 which pictures the cars I own today.

[RoyGBiv]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

If the image shows 3 cars in detail and a thief drives up and doesn't see any of those cars.... Higher likelihood that nobody is home.

[ChoqPOC]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

If the image shows 3 cars in detail and a thief drives up and doesn't see any of those cars.... Higher likelihood that nobody is home.

Exactly... Another reason why I completely agree with having surveilance camera's that text you when someone approaches and/or enters your property. Get one, or two or three.

[jimlongley]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

If the image shows 3 cars in detail and a thief drives up and doesn't see any of those cars.... Higher likelihood that nobody is home.

No argument there, but they can accomplish the same by just driving by several times.

And yes, updates are done, but mine is more than a year old while one of the houses I owned in NY State just updated for the first time in years, while the other updated more than a year ago, just five miles from each other.

If you use Google Earth, you can do a history playback which even gives you the dates the pictures were taken.

[G26ster]

Thanks for the link... I look my house every now and then and I agree, I do not like how my cars are displayed for all to see. Anyone can check the map and see how many cars I own and make a best guess on if anyone is home or not based on that map image.

The images are not real time. They were taken in the past. How would someone know if you are home or not today based on an image taken weeks, months, or years ago?

If the image shows 3 cars in detail and a thief drives up and doesn't see any of those cars.... Higher likelihood that nobody is home.

If the thief never looked at Google maps in the first place and drives by and sees no cars, isn't it the same likelihood no one is home?

[ChoqPOC]

If the thief never looked at Google maps in the first place and drives by and sees no cars, isn't it the same likelihood no one is home?

I think the point is (well, my $.02 is) not having google maps as an option for those who will check. Not considering all possible likelihoods/scenarios is where you fail. I've learned that anything can happen - stay aware and alert.

[G26ster]

If the thief never looked at Google maps in the first place and drives by and sees no cars, isn't it the same likelihood no one is home?

I think the point is (well, my $.02 is) not having google maps as an option for those who will check. Not considering all possible likelihoods/scenarios is where you fail. I've learned that anything can happen - stay aware and alert.

And my $.02 is that a picture from the past is not a basis for a thief to make a decision on today. Most houses with empty driveways indicate the high possibility that no one is home. Whether there were cars in the driveway two months ago is meaningless in my opinion. But hey, just MHO.