Gaia: Open Source Google Earth; Stopped Before I Knew It Existed
Written by Chad on November 24th, 2006This came up on the IRC channel tonight and they posted a link to the related Digg article. Gaia is an attempt to reverse engineer Google Earth and implement its functionality in open, portable, customizable and extendable way.
BUT.. you get this on their web page:
25 November 2006, we've got the letter from Michael Jones, the Chief Technologist of Google Earth, Google Maps, and Google Local search, requesting us to cease reverse engineering and improper usage of licensed data that Google Earth use. We understand and respect Google's position on the case, so we've removed all downloads from this page and we ask everybody who have ever downloaded gaia 0.1.0 and prior versions to delete all files concerned with the project, which include source code, binary files and image cache (~/.gaia).
Nice to see that Google is keeping on the ball with "Thou Shall Not Use GE Imagery Outside of a Google OK'ed Medium". Which is a "Bad Thing" because people don't realize that giving their imagery to Google means you can only view the imagery with what Google says you can view it with. Which takes the imagery out of the public domain.
The project may continue it's life as open source 3D earth viewer with GPS support, but without support Google Earth imagery. We are sorry.
Might I suggest then, coming to a World Wind OS team meeting and joining up with the World Wind Developers? You are re-inventing the Open Source Wheel 
Update: Found a screen shot someone posted:
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You said: “Which is a “Bad Thing” because people don’t realize that giving their imagery to Google means you can only view the imagery with what Google says you can view it with.”
Actually, people who give their imagery to Google EXPECT that Google only makes their imagery available through their approved tools. Allowing any usage to the contrary is a breach of the data usage agreement, and puts Google in a position of liability.
Jason
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Well, that isn’t entirely true.
Not all imagery given to Google has a restricted agreement to it. 2005 imagery of Indiana is freely availble to be viewed in other viewers, downloaded or used other wise. The group who did all the leg-work(grant writing to server space), gave a copy to GE.
Google just updated a few urban areas in Indiana using the 2005 data set.
I can see them restricting access to the copy of the 2005 imagery on their server. The only access using GE or Gmaps.
Anyone can download their own copy or access a non-GE server to view the 2005 imagery through a non-GE viewer. GE can’t restrict that in any way, shape or form.
KoS
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One one more thing.
Google can’t take public domain data out of the public domain. Unless the law gets re-written or a new one passed.
They can restict the use of commerical imagery outside of their approved viewer. If they have an exclusive agreement with a commerical imagery provider.
KoS
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Interesting. But I’ll still hold back full judgment for now.
Anyway, it will be interesting to see what the Gaia team comes up with, if anything.
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Actually.. Like the VE plug-in for World Wind.. they may look at being able to display the Virtual Earth imagery and 3D models.
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Ahh gotta love the goog, I still don’t see why they claim they arent allowed to let other apps use ‘thier’ (as kos said not all the data belongs to them) data, microsoft seems happy to let others access thier data, did they really get a better deal when they bought the virtual earth data than google did? Personally I would love to see the contract signed between google and dgital globe, come on google show us its not your fault and you aren’t evil.
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