Back in September Google launched Google Maps with NYC public transportation and subway directions. They have been heavily advertising the new option, even grabbing a special place on the MTA home page (something I am not sure if HopStop ever received).

Today I found the following images of a "wrapped" Times Square shuttle train via SubChat. I thought the little AIM guy was dead… guess not! The shuttle is running a variety of wrapped cars as a test to see if they will go systemwide to help generate more revenue for the MTA.

Car 1953 pushes the entire url complete with http://!

Car 1946 shows off the markers

Some Subchatters are wondering what’s going on in the red circle. Apparently parts of the AIM people are "behind" the windows…

More AIM people

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We don’t frequently pay mind to the world of adult-natured business on the Web. Only on occasion will we see what’s going on in “that part” of the networked world. For instance, sites like Zivity and AdultStumble have crossed our desk for brief moments in the past, and we’ve said as much.

You know where this is going. We were made privy today to a little mashup called hookupmaps. In short, it’s Craigslist (the 18-and-over part) meets Google Maps. And while the place may not behoove us to immediately toss out the NSFW item, the flag will need to fly soon enough. Once you begin browsing around, really. If you being browsing.

To delve into the details would surely be time not well spent, but a glance at the national makeup of the Craigslist equivalent of a red light district shows only two states solicitations of various, ahem, sorts, have not been scoured: Wyoming and New Mexico.  And as luck, misfortune, or plain old convention would have it, America’s coasts are where bodies seem busiest. Left of the nation’s middle, geographically speaking, Colorado’s capital city is fairly active, too. Blame it on altitude, I suppose. Keep the comments sanitary, folks, just as you would in your own home.

I don’t know how accurate it is to say Senator Barack Obama is a Mac to Senator John McCain’s PC, but those convinced of this premise will either delight in or scorn the fact that the Obama for America campaign has presented a free iPhone and iPod touch-compatible application called Obama ’08 [iTunes URL] for supporters to use.

Having browsed the application myself, I can tell you that the experience is commendable. The 1MB download is thoroughly polished, and covers nearly everything its larger relative, BarackObama.com has to offer. Technically speaking, the development is appreciable.

Though it does not harbor a connection to the social network My.BarackObama.com, the application is, design-wise, very much in line with the campaign website. No question about that. But how it functions is far more noteworthy. If you wish to read news highlighted by campaign operatives, you can do so, with the option to specify a national or local view. If you want to browse photos and videos, you may. Events are posted, too, and the campaign’s stated issues and its positions on those issues are noted in full. (Nearly all of these items can be emailed at will.)

You can also sign up to receive email and/or SMS notifications, and call anyone within your phone’s contact list, with each noted as “have not called” until you connect with them. This is obviously meant to increase outreach. (Placing calls is of course not possible with an iPod touch.)

Digging into the menu is easy enough. There’s really no trouble to be had with navigation. You can never go deep enough to get lost, to be honest. Which is just as well, because it’s an application for a political campaign, after all. There’s only so much a user can do given the matter at hand.

Nonetheless, there are some issues to be had. Browsing media isn’t handled the best way possible. For one, it would of course be a great convenience to see video playback within the application itself, but interacting with titles simply brings you out of the Obama ’08 application and over to the device’s YouTube application. This wouldn’t be something to nitpick over, but when you do venture out of the latter piece of software and back to the Obama ’08 application, you’re shown the start page once more, not the menu of videos from where you originally departed.

On the photography side of things, the supply of images is all but useless. Not because the content or presentation of individual photos doesn’t satisfy, but rather because the sheer number that is uploaded on any given day hardly makes it worth your while. The menu only allows for twenty images to be viewed, and my own time spent with the application today has shown nothing but photos titled “YouthVoteSurrogatePic….” This is not something to enjoy with any measure of frequency, that’s for sure.

Be that as it may, visual media is not the main draw here. It’s more about what the campaign is doing now and in the next few weeks leading up to Election Day, not a compendium of the last year and a half of canvassing that’s been done. For that, it will likely suffice for most users. You might not enjoy having a ‘Donate’ button that simply shows a translucent pop-up asking you to connect by phone to a campaign representative. Nor will some users like that you can only call contacts, and not send them email or SMS messages. Still, it is for the most part a solid collection of information pertaining to the Democratic ticket, making it enough of a download for iPhone-wielding Obama supporters to draw interest in.

—Related Articles at Mashable | All That’s New on the Web:Obama on LinkedInMake Your Own Obama Logo, With Your FaceWorld’s Simplest iPhone AppObama Does the TwitterGuiliani’s Own Daughter Shows Support for Obama on FacebookObiden?AirBed & Breakfast: For Obama’s Sake, Skip the Hotels

Source:Mashable!

Mark Davis is an NYC-based tech VC that blogs on technology and the venture world at Get Venture.

I recently wrote a post about the ways in which ad networks can differentiate themselves. One of the three key considerations is type of inventory.

With a belief that ads will continue to penetrate more facets of our lives, I think that ad networks targeting non-traditional inventory are quite interesting. By non-traditional ad inventory, I’m referring to media that does not currently have ads placed on it.

While I spend a decent amount of time evaluating companies that are targeting non-traditional inventories, there are a couple of reasons why we often pass:

- First, the entrepreneurs often haven’t completed a thorough assessment of their addressable market size – often misstating their market as their addressable market. After a bit of probing, I find that these companies have addressable markets that are too small for us and we end up passing. While there might be an opportunity for the business to be large enough to support a profitable business, the addressable market isn’t big enough to provide the types of returns that we need.

- Second, in order for ad networks to scale their businesses they need both advertisers and the owners of inventory to subscribe to their services. With truly non-traditional inventory, there is often a cultural chasm between the way advertisers and/or inventory owners think about the inventory and the way the ad network intends to monetize it. I’m told that there was initially hesitance to insert ads into magazines, radio shows and, yes, the Internet. While the opportunity associated with some non-traditional inventories is sufficient enough to drive adoption, for other types of inventories it’s not.

Ad networks targeting non-traditional inventories are generally very interesting to me (and potentially other investors). Just be sure you really understand the addressable market and try to demonstrate adoption before raising money.

—Related Articles at Mashable | All That’s New on the Web:MSNBC’s First Acquisition: Citizen Journalism Site NewsvineGMail: The New Social NetworkBleacher Report Takes Citizen Journalism to Fox SportsOurStage Launches, Helps Artists Break ThroughTremor Media Gets $11M to Grow Video Ad NetworkLonelyPlanet.tv - Lonely Planet Goes the YouTube RouteGigya Gets $9.5M to Grow Widget Ads

Source:Mashable!

The 2008 general election is almost upon us, but there is still time in most parts of the country to get yourself registered to vote. Luckily there are more and more online resources that can assist you with filling out your forms, provide you with local information, and even help you out if you happen to live overseas.

No matter where you are, make sure to check out what the voter registration deadline is for your state.  Some can register as late as the day of the election, but most are quickly running out of time!

Declare Yourself - Started in 2004 by TV giant Norman Lear, Declare yourself gained some notoriety this year with their “bondage” campaign featuring celebrities such as Jessica Alba (pictured above).  The group is labeled nonpartisan and nonprofit, and aims to help motivate young people to get registered to vote.

Facebook Rock the Vote Registration - Facebook partnered up with Rock the Vote to offer its users the opportunity to register directly from the popular social networking site.

Google Voter Information - Google has teamed up with the League of Women Voters to help you get information on where you need to go to get registered.  Enter your address and learn where the closest office is to you and more.  Also be sure to check out their “Don’t Vote” video featuring Leonardo DiCaprio, will i. am, and more.

Long Distance Voter - Focused on the absentee voter, Long Distance Voter has partnered with Rock the Vote to help those folks who are away from home register to vote.

MySpace Declare Yourself - MySpace is doing its part to help get people registered to vote by partnering up with the Declare Yourself campaign.  If you reside in a state that allows online voter registration, you can fill everything in from here, or they will show you where you can request a voter registration card from your state.

Overseas Vote Foundation - An organization dedicated to helping Americans who are overseas vote in their home country’s election.

Redeem the Vote - An organization formed in 2003 that is modeled on Rock the Vote, Redeem the Vote focuses their efforts on assisting young evangelical Christians to register to vote.

Rock the Vote - One of the better known campaigns, MTV formed this group to get young people registered to vote.  Rock the Vote has made a section of their site just for those who want to register from home.  Have to love their slogan, “Print it… Sign it… Lick it… Mail it!”

Vote411 - A site run by the League of Women Voters, Vote411 is about educating voters about what is on their ballot, knowing the rules for the state, finding your polling place and also getting you registered to vote.

Xbox Live - Users of Microsoft’s Xbox Live service can register to vote via their gaming consoles.  Take a few minutes away from killing terrorists in Call of Duty 4, and exercise your right as an American citizen to vote.

—Related Articles at Mashable | All That’s New on the Web:Declare Yourself: MySpace Gets PoliticalMySpace Rocks the Vote with a Battle of the BandsPolitics 2.0: From the Onion to MoveOn40+ Super Tuesday 2008 ResourcesMySpace Offers PayPal Integration for Non-ProfitsPlugg Conference - 25% OffVirtual Worlds London: Save 15% on the October Event

Roadways in parts of New York City are having their annual crisis of non-motion, a result of the gathering of the United Nations General Assembly. So what better time for the utilitarian folk at Google to ply the five boroughs and areas beyond for all manner of details concerning the mass transit options of the region?

Indeed, Google today has revealed it has produced an entire Web-based representation of lines that the MTA, Port Authority, and New Jersey Transit travel by. Which at first glance might seem a rather selective focus for the company. Still, it is said that “one in every three users of mass transit in the country” make use of the MTA system, so the provisions now officially in place in public view on Google Maps for the whole of New York City and its surroundings are bound to find appreciative consumers.

I gave the mass transit button in Google Maps a spin, charting a path from Central Park to the United Nations, and I was shown the path displayed above. In the left-hand trip guide was a detailed warning about 7 Line disruptions, with links to the MTA website for more information. Is this the most convenient option to take? You decide. Try other routes, too. See if Google is as smart with street-level and subterranean transport as a well-worn native might estimate his/her knowledge of the grid.

What the company can deliver is data for most everything in the vicinity of metropolitan New York. But as Google users have learned to recognize time and time again, an algorithm only goes so far.

—Related Articles at Mashable | All That’s New on the Web:Google Maps Expands CoverageAsk Launches Embeddable mapsGoogle Maps in (Almost) 3DGoogle Maps Street View is LiveGoogle Maps Hangs Up on Click-to-CallGoogle Maps Gets Wiki With ItTonight: Flash MashMeet in NYC!

Google has announced that their Google Maps product now supports public transit directions. This is very exciting news for me as a person who loves public transit. In my testing this morning, I give the system a grade of C. It’s a good first start and will get you to your destination but they have a lot of work to do. For example, there are many places where multiple trains share the same tracks but Google Maps only pushes you to one train. This could cost tourists 10+ minutes waiting for the train that Google suggested. There are also times where hopping on a local if it arrives first makes sense but Google also misses that. This is a project I’d love to be involved with.

The problem is that Google Maps is missing a real human expert who would say "take the 4 OR 5". It will be interesting to see how today’s Google Maps launch will affect HopStop. Google has apparently been working on this system for a year notes ReadWriteWeb.

Here’s a demo video that the Google Maps team put together. Be careful if you follow their directions from the Met to the Mets. It takes you through 2 extra transfers and a bit of walking that’s not needed. The best way is to take the 4/5 at 86th and transfer to the 7 at 42nd and if it’s in the afternoon, take the 7 Express. Any NY’er knows that

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Google is getting in on the voting season by offering a Google mapplet that will offer a wealth of voter information before the big day in November.

The site is not yet complete, but it will provide users with “voting location, registration information, and more.” What that more is has yet to be determined since, as the site points out, “all voting location information will be available by mid-October. Until then, please check with your state or local election officials to verify your voting location.”

If you input your address into the service, it won’t return any of the promised information. Instead, it provides you with the number of days left before you can’t register to vote and helps you acquire an absentee ballot if you need one.

While Google Maps is an awesome application, it has its limits and can sometimes be a pain in the behind to transfer addresses to from other websites.  Luckily, there are a slew of Firefox extensions that can help you turn Google Maps into an even more powerful tool.

As we always warn you with any list of Firefox tools, please do not install all of these at once unless you’d like to slow down your browser.

Advanced URL Builder - Lets you set the first part of a URL, such as Google Maps, and then you just highlight a zip/postal code, right click and choose Google Maps to be shown that location.

BlueOrganizer - An extension capable of reading the information contained in a page, such as an address. It automatically pulls up tools like Google Maps to help you find locations.

GDirections - Allows you to set various home addresses in memory, and then you can highlight an address, right click to select which address to begin with, and it will bring up the driving directions from the mapping service of your choice.

iPhoneSender - Right click on a Google Map and you can send a properly formatted link to your iPhone via email for easy access on the go.

Locator - Highlight an address on a Web site, right click with your mouse and choose “locate on Google Map” to be taken directly to Google Maps and shown the location.

Map This - Merges the features of a few mapping extensions in that you can highlight the address on a page to see where it is and you can also get driving directions by the same method if you choose.

Minimap Sidebar - Numerous features for mapping including drag-and-drop of addresses into the sidebar, reads geotags and has an amazing laundry list of other mapping tools.  This extension was the Grand Prize Winner in the Extend Firefox 2 Contest.

PackageMapping.com Extension - While more of a Google Maps mashup, this one is great for people who do a lot of online shopping and want to see a graphical representation of where exactly their packages are.

Pre Trip Planner for your Navigation System - Adds a link to Google Maps that allows you to plot a course for a trip and then export it to your navigational system.

Select-n-Go by Cleeki - Allows you to highlight text in a page and then choose the search engine to plug it into, including Google Maps.

—Related Articles at Mashable - All That’s New on the Web:Google Maps Now Support hCard MicroformatsGoogle Maps Hangs Up on Click-to-CallGoogle Offers Easy Embed Code for MapsCustom Icons for Google MapsMaptacular! 7 Google Maps Tools For FirefoxGoogle Maps in (Almost) 3DGoogle Reader Gets Search!

Google is under fire today over reports claiming the company failed to include any data for Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan on Google maps.  Worse, some reports suggest that once the fighting broke out between Russia and Georgia, all relevant information about the latter was wiped from Google maps.

According to the Azerbaijan Press agency, all “the relevant maps went blank as soon as fighting broke out.”  But Google contends that that assertion is simply false and it has not changed anything in quite some time.

“Google has not made any recent change to Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan in Google Maps,” the company said in a statement. “We do not have local data for those countries and that is why local details such as landmarks and cities do not appear.”

In response to even more public outcry, Google Maps product manager, Dave Barth, said Google failed to include relevant street and city information because it wasn’t satisfied with available map data.  But in an attempt to quell user distress, Barth said that Google would now input basic information about all of these countries instead of leave them blank.

And while some users are applauding Google for doing just that, I think it begs the question of whether or not Google should populate countries regardless of the quality of data, or if it should leave countries blank until it has the data necessary to make the maps as accurate as possible.

The way I see it, Google has no responsibility to its users to populate every country in the world if it feels it can’t provide them with the most accurate information available.  Along those lines, why would users even want data that Google feels isn’t the best on maps of countries that aren’t generally the most searched for in the world anyway?

As far as I’m concerned, maps should be kept blank if the data isn’t sufficient to populate them and if users don’t like it, well, that’s their problem.

—Related Articles at Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog:Google Maps Hangs Up on Click-to-CallGoogle Offers Easy Embed Code for MapsCustom Icons for Google MapsGoogle Maps in (Almost) 3DVisualize Recent Edits to Google MapsAdSense is Coming to Google MapsGoogle Maps Street View

When you watched The Goonies for the first time, did you start digging under porches and searching hollowed out trees for buried treasure? What if Chunk truffle-shuffled his way to the treasure with a GPS and exact coordinates? Seriously. How much easier would that have been?

If you’re not familiar with Geocaching, it’s a treasure-hunting game based on the community over at Geocaching.com. Their website boasts that Geocaching is “the sport where you are the search engine.” According to Wikipedia, Geocaches are currently placed in over 100 countries around the world and on all seven continents, including Antarctica.

To sum it up Twitter-style in 140 characters or less: Geocachers hide a cache somewhere in the world and log its GPS location. Others find the cache, log its find & replace it with something new.

A serious network of Geocachers over at Geocaching.com enables all of this. Some serious Geocachers also use geo-location video sites like Seero to post videos of their finds that sync with the trail from their GPS devices.

You can also use GeoGraffiti (available as an iPhone app) to leave shout-outs for other Geocachers when they get to the cache coordinates.

TomTom vs. iPhone 3G Apps

There are a variety of GeoCaching applications, but since there’s so much hype with the iPhone 3G and its supposed GPS, I wanted to test it against a more primal form of GPS: TomTom One.

The contenders in this 2-day Geocaching mission were: $1.99 GeopherLite App for iPhone 3G, the free Google Maps app for iPhone 3G, and a TomTom One GPS device.

#1: GeopherLite app for iPhone 3G

This nifty app costs $1.99 in the Apple app store. It gives you insanely easy access for finding caches. From the app, you can search for caches from your current GPS location on Geocaching.com. It lets you select a cache from the site and view all of the information about the cache. When you select a cache, it gives you the longitude and latitude needed to find the cache, which you can then enter at the top of the app.

With these coordinates, you can either then hit the “map” button and chart your course in Google Maps or use the application as a compass. The app shows you your current location as well as the cache location so that you can use your navigation skills to hone in on the target location.

Why the GeopherLite app was good:

- This app is fantastic for easy access to finding new caches if you don’t plan ahead and want to look them up on the go.

- Two options for navigation: walk around trying to match your current coordinates with your cache coordinates (like the TomTom One) or just use Google Maps.

Why the GeopherLite app was bad:

- Current location was consistently different from the TomTom One by at least 10 feet, and it never found a cache on its own.

- It gives you quick access to the Geocaching website, but there’s no back button, so actually surfing the site looking for caches is somewhat painful. Having the Geocaching website within the app is a great feature, but it doesn’t integrate enough to be that useful.

- The compass in the applications assumes that you know what direction North is, which you probably don’t.

#2: Google Maps app for iPhone 3G

This painfully inaccurate app for the iPhone works with Google Maps to get directions from your current location. It offers satellite view, which shows you a satellite image of your location, or you can choose to view it normally. Your current location is mapped by a little blue ball on the map that moves as you move.

Why Google maps was bad:

- Consistently off target, I’m talking significantly off every single time. It would follow our location, then stop and say we weren’t there yet when we’d in fact reached the location minutes before.

- Incredibly frustrating to use for such a simple application. For start-up time, this app took the longest to get going.

Why Google Maps was good:

- Satellite view will show you terrain so that you know what’s coming up ahead and you can tell if your cache is in an open area, along the road, or in the woods (or water).

#3: TomTom One

The TomTom One is a standard GPS device that goes for about $150 bucks.

Why TomTom One was bad:

- TomTom One doesn’t perform well in park areas. It literally has a brain fart of amnesia and has no idea where you are going or where you’re headed.

- You need to be moving at least 1mph in order for it to catch up to your location, so take turns sprinting to refresh your current location.

- You can’t plot exact coordinates and have it tell you where to go (like the iPhone 3G). The device will bring you as close as it can to the target, then you need to watch the screen and compare your current coordinates with the cache coordinates until you zero in on it.

Why TomTom One was good:

- It always found the cache. And what’s more important in Geocaching than actually finding the cache?

Afterthoughts

One thing to keep in mind is that this is an outdoor activity. So when it starts pouring out (like it did when I was doing this test), the TomTom One is a more viable answer for inclement weather. It also has a much longer battery life than the iPhone 3G which only lasted three hours before needing to be recharged as opposed to the TomTom One which lasted seven hours before waning down.

I was rooting for the iPhone, but the bottom line is that the GPS on the iPhone 3G just isn’t accurate enough to use as a Geocaching navigation tool by itself (yet). It was proven very resourceful for finding information, just not for applying that knowledge. If you want to get serious about Geocaching, I’d opt for a higher-end Geocaching-optimized device like the Garmin Colorado 400t which has Geocaching software right on it.

But If you decide to try out the iPhone 3G for yourself and it sends you on a wild Geocaching goose chase, just remember: Goonies never say die!

—Related Articles at Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog:World’s Simplest iPhone AppiPhone to Launch in Germany on T-Mobile3G iPhone Confirmed for 2008Mundu Optimizes Multi-Client Chat Tool for the iPhoneApple Making a Directory for iPhone Apps?European iPhone to be Offered on Multiple Carriers9 Great Games For The iPhone