Seriously, what the hell is this thing? Can anybody see what it may be, because I sure can't. [Google Street View via Geekologie]

Of course, we'll never know who the true identity of our avian avenger, but it's good to know that he's out there, watching over us, ready to unleash hell guano in our darkest hours. [Google; Thanks, Scott!]

This fine gentleman was captured by a roving Google Van with a couple of friends, a cold one, and a t-shirt that's just a wee bit too small. Carry on, brave citizen of Canada! You're an example to all of us. [Google Maps via Geekologie, Jalopnik]

View 519 H St NE in a larger map

Maybe he is about to take a dump, maybe his lady's husband arrived home early and he escaped out a window. Who knows—but the whole thing strikes me as kind of sad. Either way, the other pedestrians don't seem to notice what's going on. Not Google though—you can bet they are all over it. [Jalopnik Thanks Avi!]

Like any good stalker, Heagy was pretty organized about the entire affair. He made a sign to keep in his car so that he was ready to go the instant any of the individuals he'd recruited to watch out for the Street View van called him. In the end though, it was Heagy himself who spotted the Fame-mobile as he was nibbling on his lunch and he quickly hopped into his car, sped after the van, and figured out where it should turn next so that he could set up his sign at the right corner.

Nutty or not, I guess Heagy's plan worked since I couldn't resist extending his 15 minutes of Internet fame after seeing that Google Street View snapshot of his. Hell, the whole ploy worked so well that I'm even throwing up his band's music video:

[Fear Salesman via Neowin]

You need to download and install Silverlight to get the new Maps experience, which isn't too big a deal. It allows you to have smoother animations when zooming in or out as well as a pretty slick looking streetview interface, with trees and buildings looking cut out from their background, if a bit crudely. This is done using Microsoft Photosynth, which analyzes digital photos and creates a 3D model of the area. It's pretty damned impressive.

The real question is this: how did Bing streetview cars cover all this ground without everyone noticing? [Fast Company; Bing Maps]

Grotere kaart weergeven

Yeah, it looks like the fire truck just continued down the street like nothing happened. Look at her, in the classic "I've fallen and I can't get up" pose. Poor thing. Fortunately for the bike lady, Google did what fire fighters are supposed to do—come to the rescue. [Jalopnik]

As per the instructions by the gentleman on Reddit who found this anomaly, "click forward." And as per my instructions, click forward again. And again, and again, and again. Again!

Then sputter a little prayer in Latin, exorcise your laptop, slaughter a baby goat, whatever you have to do to help this man escape this fiery, oddly typographical abyss, which never ends. (Except for when it does, somewhere around East Pittsburgh.)

Update: Reader Chris Walker desperately clawed at the walls of the fiery nothingness for quite a while, and eventually found his way out. This is the first thing he saw when he came out?

Glorious. [Reddit]

If you have any ideas, they're looking for suggestions of parks, trails, university campuses, pedestrian malls, theme parks, zoos, landmarks, and sports venues. If you have any ideas about good shooting locales, head over to google.com/trike and submit them before October 28.

Google wants to hear about where the trike should go, but I'd rather hear where you guys think it shouldn't go. [Google]

Created for a class at West Point, Roy D. Ragsdale created his prototype setup using a laptop, $300 of off-the-shelf components and open source software. As he drives it around, it captures eight 1280x1024 jpegs that are then stitched together and uploaded to Google Earth.

It's certainly impressive, and I can see how one could want to make Street-View-like images of private property. But for most of us, I think letting Google do the heavy lifting is working out just fine. [IEEE Spectrum via Make]

Here are ten cameras designed to capture the kinds of images that humans by all means shouldn't be able to see, and that you and I will probably never have the opportunity—or need—to shoot.

View Larger Map

I can see a Porsche, a Corvette, a Mazda, and—I think—an spiffy Audi, but I'm not sure. Faster faster, kill kill pussycat. [Thanks Alteredspeed08]

Wait. What happened to West Pacheco? Why does it say I'm still on it?! And how did Google Street View know I loved the Colonel's delicious fried chicken?!

And now the Street View driver is helping me park, all while continuing to screw with my directions by saying I'm still cruising peacefully down West Pacheco.

Well, we're parked and ready for some finger lickin' goodness (and still "on" Pachero). Let's just hope no one actually uses Street View for, you know, legitimate directions—it's no wonder that people are "directed" of a cliff every now and again. [Google Street View - Thanks, Eric]

The photo shows the boy being tailed closely by two men who matched the boy's original description, but Dutch police actually had to send a formal request to Google to have the faces unblurred. When Google complied, a policeman recognized one of the men (actually twins) as a suspect wanted for similar robberies, and was able to finally make the arrest, six months after the crime.

So beware, felons: The Google cars are watching. [AP]