Google Street View, the 1907 version

This Rand-McNally road map from 1907 shows detailed directions on the Detroit to Toledo route.

(Credit: Michigan State University Library)

When Google unveiled its Street View service in May, it seemed the entire Internet went a little crazy.

But now, thanks to Google Blogoscoped, I was looking at some 1907 Rand-McNally "photo auto" images, which show close-ups of specific turns on the Detroit to Toledo driving route, and it's obvious that Google was fully 100 years behind.

These images are great: They show the specific directions that someone would have to take to go along this route, and they bear a striking resemblance to the images Google put up with Street View.

Which just goes to show that Web 2.0 is not always ahead of its time. Sometimes, you have to turn to Web 0.01. Or something like that.

[Mapper99]

Great Article...

Amazing how even though time and technology changes, the uses of the technology are the same.

[daeval]

Google Street Predecessors

Nice find! Andrew Lippman's 1978 "Aspen Movie Map" also bears a striking resemblance to google street, but was more three-dimensional and used a kind of hypertext to let you navigate to interior virtual spaces "in" some of the buildings.