Street Level Maps
I guess this is another part of Amazon’s portfolio that was overlooked, under utilized, and in the end, will probably be realized too late to capitlize on. Earlier this week, Google made waves with the announcement that they had added street-level imaging in some major cities in the United States with more cities to be added. The new feature was met with a very positive response, and it is, of course, a great feature and should be, but this is something that Amazon had years ago!
The feature seems to be turned off now, for whatever reason, but this is just another piece to the online puzzle that Amazon failed to see the value of, much like Alexa. With a healthy online sales business, Amazon quietly compiled a variety of different web services and properties that could have been further developed and monetized, but instead were left stagnant and forgotten. In the posts I read about the Google release, none of them even mentioned the Amazon offering, instead comparing Google’s recent release as trumping Microsoft’s Live Maps. Microsoft, whether coincidentally or in response/anticipation of the Google release, Windows Live Search Maps has added to the number of cities that have 3-D viewing available.