Friday, I heard about the new Google Maps, and played with it for a bit at work. As I've come to expect from the Googlefolk, it works quickly, and works pretty well.
Except: It doesn't work on Apple's Safari browser, the default on any Mac OS X installation. Not that it works any better on that "other" default-install browser: Google Maps also fails on any MSIE lower than version 5.5 — and Microsoft dropped Mac IE development after version 5.1. At least it (theoretically) works on Firefox/Netscape/Mozilla, so if I really needed to use it at home, I could fire up one of those instead.
And except: the map of my neighborhood doesn't show my street as being completed. To my knowledge, they finished this road over 6 years ago. So, I started comparing. MSN and Yahoo! Maps both use the same data source — NAVTEQ — and so also do not show our street, but oddly enough, MSN likes our new ZIP code while Yahoo! does not. Only MapQuest shows a nearly up-to-date map (and I know of at least one road that's missing in our neighborhood from there).
I love the 3D look it gives things but Google has stumbled with this venture. It is showing my development only half completed, and wilderness to the East of me across Hwy 27 (there's a developement there and has been for many years).
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