Thanks to the hard work of any number of individuals (along with Google’s willingness to trust them), certain areas of Google Maps will now be a lot more detailed.  An impressive 17 countries and territories have been deemed set to graduate from Google Map Maker to Google Maps.

Although you may not hear about it often, Google Map Maker serves an important function by allowing people to manually add details about roads, towns, and other things when traditional mapping data is unavailable.  It was introduced towards the end of 2008.

Damascus, Syria Before And After

The program’s really caught on, too, considering that this update brings the total of graduated regions to an even 160.

Anyway, this time around, the updated info relates to Brunei, Colombia, Cuba, Cyprus, the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas), the French Southern and Antarctic Lands, Kiribati, Kuwait, Nicaragua, Panama, Saint Kitts and Nevis, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, Svalbard and Jan Mayen, Syria, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Yemen.

Google may enjoy a boost in market share in these regions as a result, or at the least, there’s a distinct possibility that a few less American visitors will find themselves getting lost.