Where would we be without Google Maps? It’s easy to forget now, but the web app only came online in February 2005. How on earth (ahem, pun-intended) did we ever find our way around before then?
Nowadays, most of us take this incredible service for granted. That is, until we’re denied access to it: Apple’s ill-conceived and ill-fated imposition of its own map service on iPhone is a reminder to everyone just how much they rely upon Google’s digital cartography.*
Mapping the world is one of humanity’s greatest ventures. It has always involved incredible feats of endeavour. While they may not be risking their lives like history’s great explorers did, modern day cartographers are busy producing the most comprehensive and interactive maps of all time – their complexity is nothing short of staggering.
Search most cities on the planet using the app and you’re served up breathtaking amounts of information framed with similarly breathtaking accuracy. Yet there are still places out there that remain relatively unmapped. And it’s Google’s laudable goal to fill in those blanks.
Google Maps made headlines around the world recently with news it had tackled one of its largest, and most high profile blind spots – North Korea.
Since 2005, there had been almost no information for the 99th-largest country in the world. But on the morning of Tuesday, January 29 2013, Google launched features including buildings, roads, subway stations, parks and some of the countless monuments to the country’s ruling Kim dynasty.
Unsurprisingly, Pyongyang contains the most detail. Switching to Satellite view, it’s easy to see world-famous landmarks such as the Ryugyong Hotel and Rungrado May Day Stadium.
Outside the capital, some of the country’s less salubrious sites are also marked – namely Yongbyon, a nuclear site, and Punggye-ri, another test site. A number of greyed-out areas are said to mark some of the country’s infamous prison labour camps (200,000 people are estimated to be held in them).
While the release of the maps will partially lift the veil of secrecy on the authoritarian state for outsiders, it’s highly unlikely the maps will be of any benefit to North Koreans. According to the Guardian, only a tiny proportion of the country’s 23 million inhabitants have access to the Internet. What’s more, the “select group of officials, scientists, software engineers and students who comprise the country’s fledgling online community do not have access to Google”.
Using satellite imagery as a departure point, Google called upon “a community of citizen cartographers” to build the maps.** Though clearly proud of its achievement, the company is the first to admit the “map is not perfect”.
*iPhone users breathed a collective sigh of relief when Apple and Google reached an agreement for Google Maps to return on iOS 6.
**Turns out, this is how Google improves most of its maps.
Written by insider city guide series Hg2 | A Hedonist’s guide to…
