Google Maps isn’t just a service, it’s a service factory.
Radical openness is the key. It’s been only two weeks since it launched and already the colonization has begun. Thanks to open XML data formats and open Web programming interfaces, people have figured out how to animate routes, create custom routes with their own GPS data, and display GPS data in real time.
Microsoft could have enabled these same kinds of things years ago. Its TerraServer has been up and running since 1998. But despite Steve Ballmer’s infamous monkey-dance chant, developers haven’t flocked to TerraServer. What’s Google’s secret? Web DNA and no Windows tax. [Full story at InfoWorld.com (
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I didn’t realize developers were supposed to “flock” to TerraServer: I always figured it was just a rich man’s plaything . . .