Make your own Google Street View rig
Ragsdale hooked his camera up to a jeep and drove around West Point at up to 100 kilometers per hour capturing images. He programmed his rig to take one set of images every 20 seconds, and in an hour had 300MB of data.
(Credit: IEEE Spectrum)Google Wave is getting all the Googley press this week, but let us not forget one of The Goog's other impressive creations: Street View in Google Maps.
As part of a "disruptive technologies" course at West Point, Roy Ragsdale put together his very own Street View camera vehicle, and in an IEEE Spectrum article, he offers a fairly straightforward and cool how-to on doing the same. Why you'd want to is beyond me. Sure, it's cool, but I like to spend my spare time talking to girls.
Street View, of course, affords panoramic views of places on Google Maps so you can get a street-level view of the place you're looking at.
Ragsdale's rig uses a handful of Microsoft NX-6000 LifeCams that he picked up for $25 a pop, and a GlobalSat BU-353 GPS receiver he got for $37, all of which he plugs into a standard Ubuntu-powered laptop to map where he's been. The setup uses open-source software like luvcview from Logitech, so anyone could probably make this happen with a little tweaking. On top of that, all the parts are off-the-shelf. That sounds like it could be simple enough for a great weekend project.
What you do with the images is up to you, though. Google currently isn't accepting home-brewed Street View pictures, though it would be cool if it did. It would allow smaller towns that Google hasn't yet seen fit to Street Viewify to get on the map, as it were. But we're not holding our breath on that.
With more than 15 years experience testing hardware (and being obsessed with it), Crave freelance writer Matt Hickey can tell the good gadgets from the great. He also has a keen eye for future technology trends. Matt has blogged for publications including TechCrunch, CrunchGear, and most recently, Gizmodo. E-mail Matt. 
Dear Department of Homeland Security,
Is it alright if I drive my techno-jeep outfitted with cameras around West Point and various other military installations?
Sincerely,
Private Pyle
But then I thought you'd expect things like this when a search engine becomes a defacto monopoly, AND when in addition it owns multiple other internet-based products besides its? search engine operations. Google obviously has a vested interest to up/down index or even de-index certain sites.
It's like asking a Mercedes representative to give you an unbiased review of all car brands. Which wouldn't be so bad unless most people are forced (in one way or another) to go to that same guy for that independent assessment. It then becomes like "democratic elections" in China, where the Communist Party advises you that your best bet is to vote for its favorite Communist Party candidate.
Maybe someday this malarkey will be looked upon and regulated by the powers that be.
In the meantime, if Google won?t index back my website, I will probably consider selling both domains GoogleWaveSucks.com and IhateGoogleWave.com to the highest bidder, just like Google does with our personal data and its ad sales.