Google Street View: Harmful or Helpful?
Someone with a lot of time, gas money and snacks is cruising around America's major cities taking 360-degree pictures for Google's snazzy new Street View. Aside from the issue of privacy (The Google guy who implemented Street View first did it with A9, a company criticized after an image of women walking into a domestic abuse shelter showed up for all to see), Street View has become big time blogger fodder. Streetviewr and a number of other sites are already posting their favorite images. It doesn't take a psychic to figure out some of the winners...
But is online real estate ready to embrace this technology? The benefit of a virtual tour is that you know when someone's coming over to take pictures. The Street View guy can buzz by and snap a shot of a stray dog with a head cone snoozing in the weeds you were planning on picking real soon.
I'm imagining telling an interested buyer that, "Yes, the house is charming and the neighborhood spectacular," as the savvy real estate shopper gawks at a Google pic of the police pepper spraying a criminal on my front lawn.
Sure, they had to chase him from a bad part of town, but hey, you never know when and where the Google van will whiz by.
HOA's will love Street View because people will be even more insecure about curb appeal. My wife will rejoice that I might leave my shirt on when I mow. Sellers may want to make sure they're getting the best pictures of their home online before Google does it for them.
But is online real estate ready to embrace this technology? The benefit of a virtual tour is that you know when someone's coming over to take pictures. The Street View guy can buzz by and snap a shot of a stray dog with a head cone snoozing in the weeds you were planning on picking real soon.
I'm imagining telling an interested buyer that, "Yes, the house is charming and the neighborhood spectacular," as the savvy real estate shopper gawks at a Google pic of the police pepper spraying a criminal on my front lawn.
Sure, they had to chase him from a bad part of town, but hey, you never know when and where the Google van will whiz by.
HOA's will love Street View because people will be even more insecure about curb appeal. My wife will rejoice that I might leave my shirt on when I mow. Sellers may want to make sure they're getting the best pictures of their home online before Google does it for them.
Labels: buyers and sellers
posted by ewys at
2:22 PM
3 Comments:
Google will make billions off of Street View. Already you can see they've blanked out some corporate logos. They must be awaiting some ad money. Real estate can tie in by requesting special images of their listings. just wait...
Agreed!! Still, even knowing they are about to smack it to us, it's always cool to see what those boys over at Google are up to.. besides, most of what they do will most likely remain 'free' to the consumer / end-user.
-- and THAT benefits us all. Remember, technology is expensive. It's always good when businesses have a sound model that leverages advertising and other corporate interests (marketing, not manipulation) to provide better tools and service to the users - US!
In fact, that's one of the very things I like so much about this site - it's not out to gouge me like realtor.com and others. As an agent - it's critical that I market and advertise - I just don't want to break the bank to do it. Google, MyREALTY.com, Twitter, MySpace.com,
-rock on you guys.
whatever works. Google is innovative, and they have the money to do whatever they please.
Nevermind the whining of the peasants - there is work to be done!!
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