Google Maps

Google Promotes Latest King Kong Movie By Adding Skull Island on Google Maps

Mar 4, 2017 By

Google is among the biggest names when it comes to the world of internet technology. The company has brought forward a major innovation in the markets of internet technology, and advertising online. Google has been known to time and again tie up with various movies for promotion. Over the last couple of years Google helped promote Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Star Wars: Rogue One. In latest news, Google is now helping promote the upcoming King Kong movie, Kong: Skull Island by adding the fictional island of Skull Island to Google Maps.

Skull Island is located a couple of thousand miles west off the coast of Peru, and Google is encouraging users to post pictures and leave reviews. Over 6000 people have already responded which is quite impressive when it comes to a fictional place! Tying up with Google indeed has its own benefits. Google Maps lists Skull Island as an archaeological site. This place will play a major role in the movie as well.

Skull Island is where a team of archaeologists come across King Kong. This is a reboot of the classic King Kong series of movies, and the second in the series of Monsterverse movies. The first one in the series of was Godzilla’s reboot which came out in 2014. This movie comes out as a prequel to Godzilla. The third movie in the series is all set to release in 2019 as Godzilla: King of the Monsters, and the final part of the four-part series will release in 2020 as King Kong vs Godzilla where the two iconic characters will come face-to-face.

Google has added Skull Island to Google Maps in association with Legendary and Universal Pictures. Kong: Skull Island the movie will release next week, on the 10th of March. Thanks to Google’s advertising efforts, it looks like the movie might just get a strong opening worldwide! Check out the island on your Google Maps app right now!

Google Maps 9.44 Update Reveals Parking Availability and Surrounding Photos

Jan 18, 2017 By

Thanks to the recent Google Maps 9.44 update, the app is going to give you a decent idea regarding the parking availability of the selected area.

Suppose you’ve to catch the eight o’clock train to your office and you set out of your house at least an hour ahead of the scheduled time. However, you end up on streets in the middle of a never-ending traffic jam and you’re terribly late! That’s annoying, isn’t it? Once you step out of your home, knowing which spots are available near your destination will make route planning quick and simpler. Google, probably realized it before you did. That’s why their brand new Google Maps 9.44 update carries information on nearby parking and atmosphere images.

When it comes to technology innovations, Google is the hot shot! The company has innovated almost every app and web service that you can think of. The Google Maps is no exception.

Google Maps already gives us information on shortest route to your selected destination, nearby places, how congested your drive is going to be, and much more. Thanks to the recent Google Maps 9.44 update, the app is going to give you a decent idea regarding the parking availability of the selected area.

How does the New Google Maps 9.44 Update work?

When you turn on your navigation and search for the selected destination, a popup icon ‘P’ appears near the navigating directions mentioned below the map. Availability of parking space near your destination is marked as—‘limited’, ‘medium’ or ‘easy’. In case you’re travelling in restricted space, it’ll suggest you that parking is ‘usually not easy’ around your selected destination.

. Availability of parking space near your destination is marked as—‘limited’, ‘medium’ or ‘easy’. A Red colored P shows unavailability or limited availability of parking, a green colored P shows parking availability and a yellow P shows medium parking space.

Well, we’ve already seen something similar in case of Inrix and Waze last year. In fact, Waze was so accurate that it actually helped you find a fixed spot for parking. Compared to it, the Google app just provides you a brief overview of the arriving destination. But then, it’s still in the beta testing and the company might make relevant changes to it sooner or later.

So far, they’ve managed to add parking suggestions for airports, malls and public places. If you feel adventurous enough, you can download it from APK Mirror. If not, then wait for the official release.

Meanwhile, you can also check out ‘atmosphere’ feature. It lets you sneak a peek at the ambiance of your arrival. For example, if you’re heading to an eatery, the app shows you interiors, dining settings and the picture of its owners. Isn’t that cool! We can’t wait to test it out.

Google Maps Rope in a New “Wheelchair Accessibility” Feature like Wheelmap

Dec 18, 2016 By

Latest Google Maps show wheelchair accessibility for public places in the US.

More than 3 million wheelchair users in the US have a common question when driving to a new place—

“Can I easily get inside the building?”

It’s hard using maps for unknown location when you have a wheelchair. If you weren’t using user-friendly apps like Wheelmap, you had to look for ramps and street signs for answers. Fortunately, Google Maps will be answering your queries now on. Rio Akasaka, the Google Drive product manager will be investing 20% of its time (that is one day a week) on this project.

Google Maps Wheelchair Accessibility Feature Resulted from 20% Time Policy

This feature is an interesting outcome of Google’s 20% Time Policy, in which founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page had mentioned that they encourage their employees to spend at least 1 day of their schedule on other projects that will benefit Google more. This empowers them with creativity in innovation. Seems like the policy turned out to be in Google’s favor because several beneficial apps like AdSense, Gmail and Google News were developed in time.

Google Maps' new Wheelchair accessibility feature is a blessing in disguise for anyone who faces extra challenge getting up the stairs. Even if you have a little kid who uses pram, you might as well benefit from it. — Google Maps’ new Wheelchair accessibility feature is a blessing in disguise for anyone who faces extra challenge getting up the stairs. Even if you have a little kid who uses pram, you might as well benefit from it.

Google Maps will feature “Wheelchair accessible entrance” under the “Amenities” section of a particular location, whenever you look for accessibility options under Google. This information usually doesn’t show for all locations. Even Wheelmap didn’t have complete information in its database for major cities. Therefore, Google will turn to local guides to supply it with this information. This process will surely take some time but the end results will be favorable for families with prams and disabled individuals.

As of now, data based on user input is available for American users only. Nevertheless, for most places, you don’t have to fish for information from other users. The bigger question however is don’t all buildings and public places have wheelchair accessibility? Unfortunately no. According to the U.S. Disabilities Act, new building which were built after 1993 follow the standards set for construction. The structures that were built prior to the 1993 act may not have this provision unless they were renovated.

In any case, this new feature is a blessing in disguise for anyone who faces extra challenge getting up the stairs. Even if you have a little kid who uses pram, you might as well benefit from it.

South Korea prefers withholding its mapping data from Google:

Aug 24, 2016 By

Of all the countries whose maps are available through Google Maps, South Korea is one of the countries for which you would not be able to see mapping data.

Just like always both the north and the south of courier have been known for the conservative attitude towards other countries and have been known for their word like state. Although Google has not relative leave next South Korea in anyway comma it has still refused to handover is mapping data to Google in the past. However back in May South Korea conceded to the request of Google to provide its mapping data to the technical giant.

This came as a good source of news for Google and they felt like a huge obstacle had been crossed. But they were not really aware of the fact that South Korea was still hesitant in handing over the mapping details to the world. The country had promised to have the data delivered to Google by August 24th 2016 but now they have announced that they would take 3 months time to decide on how to proceed regarding the matter. This unexpected push back by 3 months was not expected by Google at all.

When it comes to making decisions about opening up to the world, the South Korean Government is always extra careful. They have mentioned that they would need more time to discuss comma and allies and then come up with a proper answer to Google. Google representative in South Korea has been completely focus and have been trying hard to get something out of the government officials in terms of cooperation but have only bitten the dust so far.

In the past when the Google mapping service request was extended to South Korea it was immediately turned down because the government had felt that showing the map of South Korea to the world could put the whole country in danger. Come to think of it, this is not exactly and incorrect idea. It is possible that with the help of the maths to your country any antisocial element could find it easy to bring about Anarchy and discontent among the people and cause troubles.

On an interesting note, when Google blamed South Korea for causing it to fall behind others in terms of competition in mapping services, Korea fair trade Commission on the other hand went ahead and blame the Google for why only thing the anti competition laws in the country. A formal investigation has been called again this and Google will be under the scrutiny of the South Korean Agencies for quite some time.

Waze Left Turns Of Death Finally Taken Care Of:

Jun 19, 2016 By

Waze has always been known for its wonderful interaction with its uses in order to keep their maps updated. However on the downside the application has been dispatched by many on the grounds of the incorrect navigational system that it possesses. In fact incorrect is not even the correct word for us to use, I think the correct word to use would be suicidal. We see this because Waze has many a times taken people on the path of death by giving them and incorrect navigational route especially when it comes to left turns.

Not all streets and roads have the option of turning left. However even in the cases where in the left turn is completely banned in that road, Waze still kept directing its uses on that part. This often resulted to accidents. Sometimes fatal and sometimes just a scratch people have always his troubles with incorrect left and informations that the application provided. But now the app has completely taken care of this and will keep in mind the rules and regulations of the roads in that area in terms of guiding the people who use the application to navigate their way to the destination.

All the people on theWaze team did not really work out anything much for these difficult intersections as they call them, Google team has finally taken a call on this. It is using its technology from Google Maps to take this corrective measures against the serious trouble that people face because of this application. The difficult intersections option has to be taken care of at the earliest, which was realised by Google as soon as they looked into the matter. Now instead of pushing people through these difficult intersections, the application has resorted to suggestions of alternate ways to get to their destination.

The first city that is going to see these corrective measures is Los Angeles. The application is working with the officials in the city in order to collect information on the rules and regulations that are used on the road. With the help of these all the shortcomings that have so far plagued the app will now be taken care of.

Google Maps Introduces 24 Custom Location Stickers –

Mar 20, 2016 By

Google has been a company which has been around for the past eighteen years, and has been doing a tremendous job at ruling the markets of internet technology. The company has had several divisions which have worked across various directions for them. The company is now expected to come out with even bigger and better updates for its products. One of the most popular Google app is that of the Google Maps. The Google Maps have been one of the most popular mapping applications across the planet and have been used by several users over the world. Google has now introduced Custom Location Stickers for Google Maps.

The company has introduced 24 location stickers for their users. These stickers would be used to represent places in the maps instead of the boring old yellow stars.

The company has announced this feature on the official Google Maps blog by saying –

“There are many benefits to saving your home and work addresses in Google Maps. You can use the new driving mode for one-tap access to driving directions from your home screen. If you use public transportation to commute, you can stop guessing when the train will arrive with quick access to real-time transportation information.

Home and work are not the only places you can label in Google Maps. For example, if you look up the best route to avoid traffic on your way to your kid’s school, or to see when the next bus is coming to get to your friend’s house for your favorite sitcom every Thursday, or the gym on Mondays and Wednesdays, you can now label these places for quick access to directions, traffic conditions, best routes and more.”

These custom locations are a small change indeed, but it is these small things that matter in the long run. Google has indeed taken a small step forward towards innovating the user experience, and is trying to inculcate the habit of adding more location pins to the maps.