It is indeed the little things in life that count. In looking for the location of a doctor’s office online this evening, I punched in the address into Yahoo! Maps. In the rest of the country, driving directions are all one might need to get from A to B. But, finally, someone figured out that if one lives in New York City, one might want to know which subway line to take to a specific address.
Yahoo! Maps has done it. Surrounding the starred doctor’s office on the map are very clearly labeled subway stops — and relevant distances to the office were only a click away. Not interesting? Using a technology called SmartView, one can also locate specific restaurants, community services, stores, and even ATMs near any specified address. (SmartView is so new that I could find no online documentation for it.)
SmartView does not yet allow one to see multiple locations at the same time, so if I wanted to find a buy a book, find a cafe, and then rob a bank, I’d have to try different radio buttons sequentially. In the coming search engine battles, it’s these seemingly small advances that are going to win the annual wars.
Is SmartView perfected? Not quite. In typing in my own address, I learned that the nearest “tourist spots” include “Two Little Red Hens Cafe,” the “Brooklyn Museum of Art,” and “FG Guido Funeral Home.”