14 DAY TRIAL // Google is always launching products and branching out in new directions. Knowing this, it was probably daunting for any third-party developer to create a product based on Google services for fear of the giant one day coming up with its own version. We Are What We Do, a social project aimed at helping ordinary people ‘change the world,’ managed to do it, albeit in an original fashion. The group teamed up with Google to launch Historypin, a website based on Google Street View, which enables users to upload historic images of a location.
“Historypin is a digital time machine that provides a new way for the world to see and share history, using Google Maps and Street View. The site allows users to share images - of streets or buildings, cities or villages - from their personal photo albums, as well as the stories behind them,” Laura Scott from Google London wrote.
“It’s a really unique use of Street View which means pictures can be dated as well as geo-tagged and then ‘pinned’ into place on top of modern Street View photography for people to explore over time,” she added.
The website is now live and anyone can join and upload a historic photo they may have in their collection. Of course, historic, in this case, can mean something from 1990’s as well. The emphasis is on the people getting involved and those willing to share a bit of history are encouraged to upload their photos to the site. The process is simple enough, you can use your existing Google account to log in and then upload a photo from your computer or import one from the web. The photos will then be stored in a Picasa web folder.
A critical part is the geotagging of the photos. The idea is to have the context around the photo, not just the image itself. In countries where Street View is available, you can then view the historic photo along with the modern view of the location courtesy of the photos Google has collected. For now, about 2,000 photos have been added to the site, mostly in the UK, but since you can upload a photo for any location around the world, that number should grow as more people find out about the site.