Google Didn’t Wipe Georgia Off The Map

WebProNews Staff — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 16:42:42 +0000

People noticed over the past couple of days that street maps of recently-froggy nation of Georgia were missing from Google Maps. This sparked subsequent (invented) speculation that Google had removed data about Georgia in the wake of the Russian retaliatory invasion.

They failed to notice also neighboring countries Armenia and Azerbaijan also lacked mapping data, and sure enough, Google posted notice on the Lat Long Blog that no such conspiracy to wipe Georgia off the map existed. (The details of said conspiracy are unclear, but it likely includes Russian-born Google CEO Sergei Brin.)

Google product manager Dave Barth reported that the company simply found map data for these countries unacceptable, but they are open to suggestion.

"We’re hearing from our users that they would rather see even very basic coverage of a country than see nothing at all," wrote Barth. "That certainly makes sense, and so we have started preparing data for the handful of countries that are still blank on Google Maps. Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, as well as other significant regions of the world will benefit from this effort."

Russia seems to know where they’re going. Maybe Google should ask them.

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Google Didn’t Wipe Georgia Off The Map