Finding your way in 18 new countries

In certain parts of the world, getting around is a challenge. Not only are cities in emerging economies evolving rapidly, oftentimes there are no online services to help people navigate.

One of the most requested features on Google Maps in Asia and Eastern Europe is driving directions. Google Map Maker users in these countries have been busy adding detailed data like turn restrictions, road priorities, speeds and one-ways. Using that rich data, we've been able to launch driving directions in 18 Eastern European and Asia-Pacific countries. You can now navigate using Google Maps in Albania, Belarus, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Bangladesh, Cambodia, French Polynesia, Guam, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Nepal, New Caledonia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.

Routing from Lahore to Karachi or Bucharest to Minsk has never been so easy! Next time I visit my favorite city, Hanoi, I'll be able to get around with ease.

Map Maker was created with a vision of enabling users to contribute high quality, up-to-date, routeable maps data. With this launch, for many of these countries, this is the first time users have had any directions. This has become a reality only because of our passionate users.

If you live or are visiting one of these countries, do give it a try and tell us what you think on Twitter at @googlemapmaker. As always, these are your maps - in case you don't find a road, a turn or one-way is incorrect in your neighborhood, you can map it at mapmaker.google.com.

Posted by Vishwajith Krishnamurthy, Software Engineer, Google Map Maker

Latin America Mapping Competition Winners

When we launched the Latin America Mapping Competition at Campus Party in Mexico City on November 14, 2009, we weren't sure what to expect. This was Google's first ever mapping competition, after all. When the competition closed on December 15, 2009, we were impressed with the results. For example, mapping activity increased more than 1000% in some areas of Latin America.

Timelapse of Rosario, Argentina where most roads were mapped in one day for the Latin America mapping competition.

Hundreds of mappers entered the competition. Here are the winners:

Individual Prize
Winner: Daniel Mugaburu
"I've mapped several cities in Peru (my country of origin) because I know it very well, and a lot of areas need urgent updates. I've been mapping for almost one year already and I plan to keep on doing it. My motivation has always been helping others to find streets, hospitals, etc... in order to increase their life quality."
Born and raised in Peru, Daniel currently lives in Connecticut, USA.

Team Prize
Winner: The "Ukrainian Team" consisting of 8 mappers in Austria, France, Peru and the Ukraine who used Gmail, Google Wave and Google Docs to coordinate their mapping efforts.

• Anton Berezhnyi, team leader
  
• Boris Villagarcia
• Cesar Adrianzen
  
• Christian Monzon Cardenas
• Matthieu Abribat
• Olga Sokalska
  
• Vasiliy Saenko
• Yevgeniy Kolesnyk
  

City Prize
Winner: Lima, Peru
La Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos will receive the 100 laptop donation.

Congratulations to all the Latin America Mapping Competition winners, and we invite mappers everywhere to participate in the Global Mapping Competition benefiting UNICEF that runs through January 31st.

Posted by Jennifer Mazzon, Maps Community Organizer

Find us at the National Retail Federation Big Show in NYC next week

Shoppers are increasingly turning to Google.com and Google Maps to find, learn about, map, and get directions to retail locations. We offer several tools that help retail businesses connect with these shoppers, such as Local Business Center to make sure your listings are accurate and contain many relevant details, and embeddable Google Maps to power your online store locator.

That’s why several of us from Google will be attending, presenting, and demonstrating products next week at NRF 2010, the National Retail Federation’s annual convertion and expo at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. We’ll be speaking at a session on Tuesday (January 12) at 11:30am (EXPO Hall, 3D04) called Helping Shoppers Find You.

We’ll also have a booth in the Expo Hall (Booth #365) so attendees can chat with us directly about Google Maps and Local Business Center. Any question is fair game! Look for the Google logo on our booth wall and a big map of Manhattan at the floor of the booth. We hope to see you there.

Posted by Andrew Chang and Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Managers

Look who's modeling!

[Cross-posted from the Google SketchUp Blog]

The Google Model Your Town Competition is running full-steam ahead with over 400 pins in the world map representing teams from six continents. From places like Cauquenes, Chile to Cape Town, South Africa to Suva City, Fiji to Alirajpur, Madhya Pradesh, India to Aberdeen, Scotland to Tallin, Estonia and Burlington, Iowa people have taken on the challenge of representing their communities.

Folks in Iowa, Colorado, and British Columbia are motivating community members by building their own websites, garnering local press, tweeting, and soliciting help in online forums. Some are offering training on how to model to anyone interested. Iowa is asking middle and high school educators to form and advise teams of students.

There are still many people looking for team members. Visit the official group to meet folks in your area, or to post your own questions, ideas, or comments about the competition. The deadline for entering is March 1st of this year. Start the entry process by adding a pin to the map on our Get Started page and follow us on Twitter @modelyourtown.

Posted by Allyson McDuffie, Model Your Town Competition Team

Shaking things up

At around 10:00am in Mountain View, our building shook. Really shook. Coming from the Midwest, earthquakes have always intrigued me (I wondered things like: Does it really feel like you're standing next to a freight train? Answer: Yes). So being the earthquake-phile (or earthquake-noob) I am, I immediately jumped into Google Earth to check out what had happened. Thanks to the real-time USGS Earth feed, I was able to quickly find out the details. Opening up the 'Gallery' folder and clicking on 'Earthquakes' I was able to see that it was a magnitude 4.1 earthquake, with an epicenter just across the bay -- yikes!

The USGS also maintains their own KML file, which contains links to even more details. Here's that file embedded in the browser-based Google Earth plug-in:

Armed with this information in real-time, I was able to share the details in real time with my jealous (and some not-so-jealous) friends still in the Midwest.

Posted by Pete Giencke, GIS Data Engineer

Google Map Maker Ambassadors -- party on!

All around the world, our Google Map Maker users have been in high-gear over the past six weeks, becoming Map Maker Ambassadors by organizing local events to spread the word about how people can map the places they know and love. Supported by Google, these dedicated mappers have secured event locations at local universities, translated presentations and brochures, publicized the events and coordinated with the local mapping community.

Power-mapper Mihai organized a Map Maker event in Bucharest, Romania in mid November:

Serbia mapper Jovica organized a Map Maker event at Novi Sad University in early December:

Ulziisaikhan & Tsengel organized several "Map Maker Fairs" in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia in December:

Tilek Mamutov, a Dublin-based Googler and a top Map Maker user in Kyrgyzstan organized two Map Maker events in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan and Almaty, Kazakhstan in late December:


And to ring in the new year for mappers in Pakistan, super mappers Faraz and Jabran, with help from fellow mappers Omer and Khurram organized a mapping party in Lahore on January 2nd (more pictures here):


Here's a big shout-out and thank you to our Google Map Maker Ambassadors, and we're looking forward to similar events being organized in Kerala, India (February 5th) and elsewhere. In the meantime, check out the Google Map Maker Global Mapping Competition benefiting UNICEF that runs through January 31st.

Posted by Jennifer Mazzon, Maps Community Organizer

Google Maps on Nexus One

We're really excited about today's launch of Nexus One. The device is the newest phone to run on the Android platform with Google Maps for mobile pre-installed, and the app has never run better. Nexus One has a super fast 1GHz processor and feels as fast and responsive as any phone.

But my favorite thing about Nexus One is the beautiful, 3.7" high-resolution AMOLED display. I use Google Maps Navigation (beta) constantly for turn-by-turn guidance and traffic, and having such a large, clear display makes a world of difference. Maps are more readable, and satellite and street-level imagery look amazing. And when I pull up to my destination and a large, crisp Street View is shown automatically, I know exactly what to look for.

Nexus One ships with Android 2.1, including the latest version of Google Maps and Navigation. It also has all the other new features we've launched in the past year, such as Google Latitude, layers, and labs.

To learn more about Nexus One, visit google.com/phone.

Watch the video on YouTube to preview Google Maps Navigation on the Nexus One:

Posted by Michael Siliski, Product Manager