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Oct
15
Google Earth and YouTube have teamed up so that you can now watch videos in the popular mapping program based on where they were created or where they take place.
In theory, this is a nice addition to Google Earth, and it seems it could actually add real value. The question becomes, however, who decides which videos actually get in for the location they are listed for?
In the picture at the top of this post, there is a video of July 4th fireworks on the National Mall in Washington D.C. The YouTube icon found on the map is pinned on the Washington Monument, smack dab in the middle of the Mall. This, obviously, is how the system is supposed to work.
If you move on up the Mall to the Capitol, however, the only YouTube icon currently pinned onto the august rotunda of that building gives us a video of … Star Trek.
Even the most enthusiastic Trekkie would admit that this, alas, is not how the system should work.
One has to wonder how long it will be before this interesting feature will be completely over-run with spam.
Although there may be an editing system in place, YouTube doesn’t make that clear. They simply say the following:
You can tag your video with a location during the upload process on YouTube. Simply click the “Date and Map Options” to display the maplet, then drag the marker or use the search browser to choose a specific location. Once your location is recorded, your video will appear on Google Earth.
If there is, in fact, any editorial control over this system, then I fear we already have a glimpse of how it’s going to work.
To get to the YouTube videos on your Google Earth page, you will need to go to the left-hand side to the Layers section, then to Featured Content , and then tick the option for YouTube as in the image below:
LINKS:
If you don’t have Google Earth, you can download it here.