I hate Google Earth (and Pro)

Not really, but I do. I play around with with Google Earth, but I work work in GIS. I appreciate Google’s efforts to popularize mapping and geolocation. But Google Earth makes it harder to do my job.

Now the general population thinks they are map makers, or data collectors, because of Google Earth. People in my office create kml or kmz files and expect my staff to add it to their report in our company format. They think that Google is using the most up-to-date imagery and data available. What they don’t realize, that is just the licensing date at the bottom of their screen. When the aggregator/collector released the information. The imagery can be much older than attributed. The vector information is not necessarily the most up-to-date or even correct. Its what is available through private or public sources.

My staff and I will even go to the agency and attempt to obtain the same information found on Google Earth, only to be told it is unavailable from them and they don’t know where Google got that info. Google makes it available through a Save As feature… as a kml/kmz file. Which I can’t use. For one, I am not going to attribute Google as a source partly because it is undated. Secondly, I can’t use kml/kmz files in my software.

I appreciate what Google is doing with Map and Earth. They allow people to look at things they would otherwise never see. They allow a perspective of our planet that the population would have a hard time grasping. But in this instance I believe Google is doing a little evil.

This entry was posted on August 20, 2008 at 7:42 pm and is filed under Information, Data Sources. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.