Category Archives: city guides

You too can be Rand McNally

Posted on September 10, 2008 by Rakesh Agrawal

How long does it take to get from Pike Place Market to Mount Rainier National Park? According to Google Maps, it’s a 5 minute walk; less than 1/3 of a mile. Pretty easy, huh? In reality it’s a 2 1/2 … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, flickr, geotagging, google, gps, iphone, lbs, local search, maps, satellite navigation | 6 Comments

Yahoo! Local gets Yelpy

Posted on December 13, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

Yahoo! Local has rolled out some new features to increase the Web 2.0-ness of its local search product: RSS feeds. You can subscribe to feeds of all reviews near you. If you find a reviewer you like, you can stay … Continue reading →

Posted in advertising, city guides, local search, search, web 2, web 2.0, yahoo, yelp | 1 Comment

Let Google Maps do the walking

Posted on August 27, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

Matt Cutts points out a great mashup for apartment hunters: Walk Score. One of the most important criteria I have when looking for a place to live is whether I can walk to (or stumble back from) places. Walk Score … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, google, local search, maps, mashups | 2 Comments

Google Maps launches local reviews

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

In a potentially huge blow to local services like Yelp, CitySearch, and AOLCityGuide, Google is now offering users the ability to leave reviews for businesses they search on. To date, Google has aggregated reviews from those sites and others in … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, google, local search, maps, web 2, web 2.0, yelp | 6 Comments

Outside.in puts neighborhood news on the map

Posted on June 7, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

Brady at O’Reilly Radar has a great post on Outside.in. The startup aggregates local blogs, organizes them by neighborhood and plots them on a map. I’ve written before about the importance of being hyperlocal. If I were running a media … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, geotagging, journalism, local search, maps, media, newspapers, web 2, web 2.0 | Comments Off on Outside.in puts neighborhood news on the map

AOL launches local beta

Posted on March 16, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

AOL Local has a beta of a new map-based search product. It’s a solid first effort, and one that is competitive with offerings from Google, Yahoo! and Yelp. AOL Local plays up AOL’s primary differentiator over the competition: exclusive content … Continue reading →

Posted in aol, city guides, google, local search, maps, yahoo, yellow pages | Comments Off on AOL launches local beta

Photos, rooftops and subway stations on Google Maps

Posted on March 8, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

I must be on the same wavelength as Google engineers this week. Yesterday, they released a send-to-car feature that I’d blogged about the day before. Today, after finishing my post on predictions for satellite navigation, I opened Google Reader to … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, flickr, google, local search, maps, satellite navigation, transit | 5 Comments

Top trends and predictions for satellite navigation

Posted on March 8, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

Yesterday, I wrote about my experiences with various types of satellite navigation. Here are some of the major trends in the space and my predictions for what we can expect to see in the next three years. Trends that will … Continue reading →

Posted in aol, cars, city guides, consumer electronics, flickr, google, gps, local search, maps, mobile, mobile search, satellite navigation, wireless, wireless data, yahoo, yellow pages | 3 Comments

World Explorer: A new way to look at the world

Posted on January 19, 2007 by Rakesh Agrawal

The folks at Yahoo! Research have used flickr’s APIs to create a new way to look at the world. The TagMaps take tags from flickr and plot them on Yahoo! maps. The current implementation is slow and the display of … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, flickr, geotagging, gps, local search, maps, travel | 3 Comments

Following local search to nowhere

Posted on October 10, 2006 by Rakesh Agrawal

One of the big frustrations I have with local search is that the data is often old. With many sites, the information can be 18 months old. More than once I’ve driven to businesses that were no longer in business. … Continue reading →

Posted in city guides, google, local search, web 2.0, yellow pages | Comments Off on Following local search to nowhere