They need this for Philly.

Acoustic Rock

It has been done before. This is merely a simplified version of one of the first multimedia demos, "The Aspen Project." That must date back to the mid 1970s. It was a computer controlled videodisk, you could "walk" down the Aspen streets and point to any building and get detailed info.

Edited by author 01-16-2003 03:52 PM
This was was being built around '97-'98, it's almost as old as the original Virtual Carnaby Street site which i worked on. Still, Streetsensation is still in existance while Version1 of VCS was dumped after 2 years in favour of something less funky, so that must mean something.

Wouldn't it be cool if the Yahoo Yellow Pages linked to something like this?

Related notion; James "talented nostaliga crank" Lileks once suggested that people video tape the storefronts of their local downtown each year, to create a record of how the street scene changes through time. I like that idea a lot.

SeemlessCity is a site that is doing the same thing for SF, but more of an art project than a commercial map. I've pitched something more grandious for SF which would include a commercial list, history fact and user comments for each address (zagat-like). more cross-referencing and user input could make it a lot more fun. you could then relink it with a mapping system like map quest or MUNI's online map system for transportation. go nuts.

The French Yellow Pages have this too - http://www.pagesjaunes.fr/pj.cgi?lang=en - for nine different cities. And it is not just for selected shopping streets - it is for much of the city, including residential neighborhoods.

David "Married to a Parisian" Brake

Well, talk about something that sounds neater in theory than it works out in practice -- this website is it.

I am sure I have seen a site like this before - of London, if not other cities in England. I definitely "walked" nostalgically up and down Haymarket! It may have been a feature of one of the UK map websites, but I haven't been able to find it since - any ideas??