Yandex StreetView for Moscow

spanic — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 06:13:57 +0000

On the 10th of September Yandex made a move that was quite predictable given the fact that the leading Russian search engine began copying various Google products quite a while ago and has enough power to promote such products in Russia given its leading position in the online market of the country. The latest addition to its range of services is panoramic view of the streets of Moscow – similar to what Google Street View now does for many countries of the world.

Right now on the streets of Moscow you can see real people, their cars and whatever was there when the streets were shot – and chances are this is how it will remain even if some people decide to protest. The reason is that in Russia no permission is needed from people when they are parts of panoramic photos taken in public spaces unless these people are actually the main subject of the shot. This is the policy Yandex is going to follow and the only reason they quote as good enough for blurring something out of the photos is upon request of law enforcement agencies – otherwise people or their property will remain.

Check it out for your self. Just go to http://maps.yandex.ru/, find Moscow, select panoramic view (you may have to zoom in to get this option to appear), and click on any of the blue-coloured streets.

I didn’t find an english version of yandex so here’s a little picture tutorial.

1- Go to http://maps.yandex.ru/, type in moscow and click the search button. [Click on pics to enlarge]

Click the panoramic view button if it’s not already green.

Now simply click on any of the blue highlighted streets inside Moscow. Zoom it, move around, everybody knows how that works right?

English Russia » engine

Yandex StreetView for Moscow