Me on Google Street View

It was my first week in the Singapore office when they got everyone to go down to wave at the passing Google Street View car. I just remembered today about this because of the recent launch in the Philippines so I took a screenshot.

Here it is!

Can you spot me? (So easy to tell coz I was being my usual Filipino self taking a photo of the car, haha). 

Google Street View Launched in the Philippines!

It's a happy, happy day! Google finally launched Google Street View in the Philippines today! That means we're going to start seeing the Google Street View cars plying around Metro Manila to take images.

The cars were unveiled at the launch today together with Sec. Mon Jimenez, Department of Tourism, Ryan Morales (Google Philippines head of marketing) and Gail Tan (Google Philippines head of PR).

Secretary Jimenez warned us we're going to get thousands of blurred faces on the images.

Images will be collected using these devices:

The car.

The Trekker, which is btw really heavy!

And the Trolley, not as pretty as the car/trekker but it's going to be used for areas that have narrow pathways.

The launch also showcased the Intramuros special collection which the team worked on during the holidays. The youngest administrator of Intramuros (he's only 33!), Marco Sardillo III, shared how they collaborated for this project. (And yes you can embed Street View images on your blog! See below). You can check out the following sites: San Agustin Church, Baluarte de San Diego, Plaza San Luis Complex and Fort Santiago by going to http://www.google.com/maps (click on the name of the place on the map and select Street View).

View Larger Map

I'm sure my mapper friends are all excited! Thanks to Allan, Wayne, Anne, Josan and Reymart who took time out from work to attend the launch and for representing the communities in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.

The cars will start driving around today so we have to wait a bit for the images.

Special congratulations to the team who worked hard to bring this to the Philippines especially Gail and Ryan! And thank you to the many other people who helped make this happen. Woohoo!

More awesome photos from the launch here.