Friday, July 17, 2009

Fed UP with Google!!

Have you ever gone to www.google.com/maps and typed in your address? If you haven't, do so now. Then, when a picture comes up, click "Street View". Prepare to be horrified. This is NOT the same thing as Google Earth, which shows an aerial view of your home. This is a picture of the front of your home, and you can pan all around your neighborhood, so actually, you can see your home, your car, your neighbors' homes, etc. from infinite views.

The first time I did this, and saw my own car in my driveway, a wreath on my door, the flowers in my flowerbeds, I was shocked. Some argue that it's not an invasion of privacy, because anyone can walk up and down my street and they can even take pictures if they want to. I ask you this: can anyone, anywhere in the world, at any hour of the day, walk up and down my street and see what car I drive and where I walk? NO they cannot! Except wait, now they CAN!

Here's what's got me REALLY riled up today, though: this is not new! I first saw this - gosh, at least a year ago. I was incensed at the time and demanded that they remove any traces of my house. And they did.

So this morning? To randomly check it out again and find my house BACK ON THERE? SO not oKAY! Who wants to represent me in court???

Oh, and here - in case you hate this too, here's how to get it removed. I googled how (oh, the irony) and the instructions I found were up to date, because the sneaky snakes have made it harder.

Go to www.google.com/maps. Type in your address. When it comes up, there will be a little box showing a thumbnail of your home. Click "street view". Once the full picture comes up, you'll see a small watermark-style link at the bottom of the picture that says, "report problem". Click that and fill out the form. Make sure you click one of the blue links, then the bubble, so that you can explain why you want it removed.

Off to do some deep breathing and calm down!

6 comments:

  1. A friend of ours was coming to visit from out of town & sent me a link to a picture of our house to ask if he had the right one. I about died. Scary stuff!!

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  2. Anonymous8:37 PM

    I love google maps! For that reason and that reason only!

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  3. goodness, you got me all riled up too. i just removed my house too. thanks emily!

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  4. I can't believe they took it off then put it back on. Surely if they changed the rules for taking it off they should have sent an email to everyone whose had been taken off to inform them of the new rules and that their house would be added back unless they re-complained. I am assuming you needed to put in an email address for the initial complaint.

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  5. Luckily for me, it only has a picture of the other houses on our street. Apparently whoever took the pictures didnt get a close up of our house, but there is a 360 of the street. Kind of scary! If my car or my kids were out there, i would be livid!

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  6. i checke dmine and can tell you the shot is at least a year old- since it had 2 cars in front of our current house that are not ours (or friends) and the yard was obviously pre-foreclosure :) I checked our old house and it had to have been taken when we lived there based on the yard... however, neither house showed up with the correct address.... I had to scroll through to find my actual home

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