Walking Pier 39 with MapJack. Going where no cars have gone before.

I know its research tuesday and I will post a few interesting reads from McGonigal and SSRN a little later on but for now more MapJack goodness.

You thought you were alone walking along San Fran’s Pier 39 on a sunny day about year ago. Did you notice someone with a weird camera pack? Well apparently they noticed you. True to its marketing statements MapJack has mapped a number of pedestrian only walk-ways and judging by peoples faces their camera rig must have really stood out.

What others have done with NASA budgets and Star Wars-like equipment, we’ve done on a shoestring budget, along with a few trips to Radio Shack.

This is by far one of the coolest privacy invading uses of technology I’ve seen in a while. I cant wait till they map central park, so many “quickies” in the park to be captured for the world to see, so little time.

MapJack is Street View with better pictures

I love Google’s Street View. Its an awesome application that allows you to virtually roam city streets and get snapshots of neighborhoods, sometimes even your neighbors. However the images are often blurry and the interface isnt the most intuitive. There are lots of weird effects in the pictures, which have become a form of entertainment in their own right.

Enter MapJack. A new site with provides all the voyeristic goodness of Google’s Street View except with much clearer images and superior interface. Although the site currently only has 3 city’s mapped, the clarity and depth of their mapping won me over. They have mapped more of San Fran then Google. Acccording to the site, they map cities “on foot, by car, and by boat.” They say thier mapping doesnt simply stop curbside they also “include walking areas such as Parks, Universities and famous walking streets.” And as everyone who’s traveled knowns, the most interesting sites rarely occur on main street.