Do you think they chose black cars so they wouldn't stand out?

Even Google can't afford Black Helicopters

these cars cannot be legal. That camera pod on the roof will become a lethal projectile in an accident and then Google is going to have to spend a few of it's millions in court fees and compensation.

who thought the Street View thingamy was quite nifty?

If by some freak incident my mush ended up on one I can't imagine crying myself to sleep.

Well the black car bit would be ok but the 5ft Camera on the roof might be a bit of a giveaway, they would be better with a fleet of pope mobiles.

Black cars, black helicopters, they are all the same.

Here's a competion suggestion - a stack of El Reg goodies to the first person to find a picture of themselves taking a picture of the google spy cars on street view? (Something to do whilst looking for bulgarian airbag snaps anyway.....)

I'll look forward to google giving us Hi-res pictures of all the winos, crack addicts, whores, whore-users and trustafarians in Stokes Croft. Money well spent.

Can you imagine trying to get a helicopter between all the lamp posts?

"Do you think they chose black cars so they wouldn't stand out?"

Perhaps they figured white cars with the Google logo sprawled across them was a little too high profile so they went with the very stealth black paint and technological gubbins covered with a bin liner instead. :)

I saw it on Deansgate in Manchester about 1:30pm today. No picture, but it defintely was there shilst I was crossing the road just before Waterstones!

i think because they used an everyday car (vauxhall astra..the same one the police use) they would blend in...

Paris..because she knows about geting spied on

Spotted by Plusnet staff:

http://community.plus.net/blog/2008/07/15/google-streetview-spycar-spotted-in-sheffield/

In that case, WTF are these cars for?

Clearly they're working on some sort of non-visible wavelength that'll cause cancer and kill our kids. It's called "TerrorHurts" radiation for a reason, people! And it's radiation so it's evil!

Skull and crossbow because someone will die if these rotters aren't left unchecked. Think of the children!

Good grief, of all the places to take your expensive camera equipment, Stokes Croft in Bristol is not it!

I wonder if the street view footage will just show a pack of hoodies approaching with a socket set :-)

Overheard:

crack addict 1:"this stuff's good - I can see things growing out of the cars"

crack addict 2:"AAARRRRGGGH! WOOF! BuggritMilenniumhandandshrimp."

I'd love to see a fleet of popemobiles driving around our towns and cities.

Spying on the spy car using its own tools....

Could have saved themselves a fortune in petrol by using the UK's comprehensive CCTV network. Real time feed too...

yeh yeh, google this, google that.

theres only one aim.

to find Bin Laden.

Get out the stinger ! (the tyre deflation device not the missile.. that'd be harsh even for Google)

What browser are you using to use Google Maps? I use Firefox and I've got it so that the entire area of the window that shows webpages (probably 2/3, 3/4 of the screen) is covered. Hardly squashed into a corner. Sounds like the browser you're using isn't as good as the apparently pretty useless Firefox...

You can get rid of the sidebar using the small "collapse sidebar" arrow, widening 'maps out to the whole screen-width.

Google maps is great. Not quite as awesome as Google Earth with its terrain mapping and vast quantities of other data, but still great!

It's just mad American people (mainly; not all American people are mad, i'm married to one but whether that means she IS mad or not I can't say..) who are feeling left out at not having anything to sue somebody for........I do think all this privacy stuff is hilarious...I agree with the guy who mentioned appearing in loud outfits across the world in Streetview...it's be called GoogleSpoogle or GoogleFroodle something like that....(oh, before that catches on, I'll mail myself a printout in triplicate so I can sue anyone who uses that without askin me first lol)...I'd spend ages looking for me or someone I know for my amusement when I'm bored

Just saw one 10 minutes ago. It went 1 and 1/2 times round a mini roundabout.

How many of these things are there? What is the collective noun - plague, infestation?

But Wikimapia is powered by Google Maps

Interesting...

The shared map that Chris refers to is just round the corner from my office.

Perhaps it's not a StreetView car after all but a clandestine surveillance team from El Reg HQ keeping tabs on me...

Am I right to be paranoid? Have I got enough tinfoil?

What do you mean "not the missile"? Surely that'd be one of the best uses for a Stinger, and it'd rather dramatically demonstrate what people think about the potential invasions of privacy from this :)

How long before google add a live track map? right back at ya!