Auckland bus stops in Google Earth

Since Jonah asked for it, I have generated a KML file of the Auckland bus stop data. If you have Google Earth installed then click on this link to see the stops overlaid on an actual map: http://www.rabidgremlin.com/viz/auckland_bus_stops_kml/auckland_bus_stops.kmz

If you hover over a red dot you will get the stop’s number. Interestingly if you zoom in enough, you will see that Google already has all the stops loaded and if you click on a little bus icon under a red dot, you will get the route info for that stop.

Have fun.

Google gets into games and watches you from space

Two interesting bits of news from Google today. The first is adsense for games which allows game developers to place Google ads inside games.

Only flash games are currently supported and there are some fairly hefty entry requirements for early adopters:

  • Game plays: Minimum 500,000 per day
  • Game types: Web-based Flash only
  • Integration: Must be technically capable of SDK integration
  • Traffic source: Must be 80% US & UK Traffic
  • Content: Family safe and targeted at users age 13 and up
  • Distribution: Must be able to report embed destination and have control over where games are distributed

I’m having visions of playing Counterstrike and seeing dynamic ads on bullet-ridden billboards in the future…

The second bit of Google news is their first images from the new satellite GeoEye-1 which will be used to update Google maps and Google Earth imagery. Apparently GeoEye-1 is the world highest resolution commercial sattelite with a resolution of 50cm ! Google sightseeing should get really interesting now and those naked sunbathers better have satellite position timetable handy.