Garmin has announced its entrance into the mobile phone market with the nüvifone, an all-in-one, sleek and slim, touchscreen device that combines a premium phone, mobile web-browser, and cutting-edge personal navigator.

“The nüvifone is an all-in-one device offering unmatched integration of utility and function in a single mobile device,” said Cliff Pemble, Garmin’s president and COO. “This is the breakthrough product that cell phone and GPS users around the world have been longing for – a single device that does it all.”

The nüvifone is an innovative mobile phone that has a wide range of advanced yet easy-to-use features. The all touchscreen device is the first of its kind to integrate premium 3.5G mobile phone capability with an internet browser, data connectivity, personal messaging, and personal navigation functions in one device. The 3.5-inch touchscreen display reveals three primary icons – “Call,” “Search,” and “View Map” which allow the user to effortlessly master the nüvifone’s functions.

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The controversial Google Street View project has arrived in Australia taking snaps in our major cities and towns.

The project has already captured images at street level in 17 US cities and attached them to the highly popular Google Maps online application.

It was launched in the US in May, and quickly attracted controversy after claims several images breached privacy.

Some images identified men outside strip clubs, women sunbaking in parks and even captured a woman’s g-string as she emerged from her car. Soon after, Google modified several images to remove or mask the identity of individuals.

Google Australia’s head of corporate communications Rob Shilkin said Australia’s privacy laws were tighter than those in the United States, and that no one’s privacy would be compromised.

“We’re giving very considerable thought to how best to safeguard Australian’s privacy, including consulting experts and community groups, while enabling all Australians to benefit from this new feature,” Mr Shilkin said.

“We’re focusing on finding ways to ensure that individuals’ faces are not identifiable in pictures taken in Australia and that licence plate numbers are not identifiable in Australia.”

Cameras mounted on top of “Google-labelled” cars will travel around Australian cities and towns, pausing to take a 360-degree photo, record the location of the image using GPS, and then move to the next location.

The images will be collected throughout summer and are likely to appear online in the second half of next year. (via news.com.au)

Google Maps users in the USA, Australia and New Zealand now have the ability to edit specific locations on Google Maps. Software Engineer for Google Maps, Seth LaForge, announced on the Google LatLong blog that the software will now allow users to place markers on the correct location in the event that it had been incorrectly placed to begin with.

“Take your favorite restaurant, for example. Now you can find it on Google Maps and move the marker to its front door. You might just save someone’s date with this information! Fixing markers can be downright addictive. I’ve spent hours using Street View to locate businesses and houses, and then moving their markers.”

To avoid vandalism the software also records the original location marker so that users can compare the two wiki-style and correct incorrect changes. Users require a Google Account to take advantage of the new feature.

Rochester, New York — Strafford County residents might have seen a strange looking orange minivan driving around in the last few weeks, capped with multiple cameras and foreign looking wired machines. Some might have asked themselves, What in the name of all that is good and holy is that thing doing?

The vans represent the next stage in maps. For nearly 42 centuries, maps changed very little. They became more accurate, but they remained a two-dimensional representation of the land and water underneath us.

But cartography has come a long way in the past 40 years. And Rochester and its surrounding communities have just been recorded.

Tele Atlas, a global corporation based in The Netherlands with American headquarters in Lebanon, N.H., is in the second phase of a three-year project, mapping the United States and Canada precisely.

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In a world where portable G.P.S. navigation devices cost less than US$200 and free mapping software from Google, Microsoft and AOL is available online, is there any reason to buy a trip-planning program for your computer?

Apparently, Microsoft and DeLorme still think there is. Both companies offer extensive trip making programs updated for this year. Microsoft’s Streets & Trips 2008 comes in various versions, but the basic US$40 package includes road maps of the United States and Canada, as well as 1.6 million points of interest, like A.T.M.’s, hotels, and restaurants.

DeLorme’s US$40 Street Atlas USA 2008 includes similar mapping and planning features, and the company says it has more than four million points of interest, as well as highway maps of Mexico and the ability to transfer maps to an iPod.

To picture how these programs are supposed to be used, just recall how mom and dad used to spread out maps on the dining-room table to plot the family vacation weeks in advance. That’s who these products are aimed at: people who enjoy planning ahead and then printing out maps of their route.

To compete with satellite navigation systems, both products can be decked out with an optional Global Positioning System antenna to deliver live, spoken, turn-by-turn directions, albeit from a laptop computer in the front passenger seat.

Nevertheless, neither can compete against the portable navigation devices available from Garmin, TomTom and Magellan. It’s just much easier to spot an approaching turn on a small screen perched on the dash than it is to glance at a computer on the seat — or at a map in your lap, for that matter. (via The New York Times)

Gasoline pump maker Gilbarco Veeder-Root said Wednesday a new service will let drivers use Google Maps to get directions while filling up at the pump.

Mountain View-based Google Inc.’s mapping service will be integrated into Gilbarco’s Applause media system, which has been incorporated in its Encore pumps with color screens and Internet connections.

“Getting directions at the pump is safer than using Internet-enabled devices from the driver’s seat and far more reliable than just asking a stranger,” Kirsten Paust, VP of global retail systems at Gilbarco, said in a statement.

Participating stations will provide a color screen where users can go online to search for directions and landmarks. A hard copy will be available off the receipt printer.

Gilbarco plans to roll out early next month, initially at about 3,500 gas pumps. (via East Bay Business Times)

Google Maps

Provides directions, interactive maps, and satellite/aerial imagery of the United States. Can also search by keyword such as type of business.

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