
To find the Norks on google
Disable Safesearch.
We're not quite sure what's going on down at Google Maps, but the search monolith's cartographical service has decided that the world would be a better place if North Korea were one big blank: North Korea map on Google Maps Satellite imagery is still available, and a search for Pyongyang works fine... Sat image of …
So he ate shark's fin soup four times a week, sushi once a week and dog soup* on Sundays. Does that mean that even the Dear Leader is only eating six times a week, in solidarity with his starving compatriots?
* Eating dog is quite rare in Korea, according to a non-scientific poll of the three Koreans I know. Two (from Seoul) said "Ew! No!", and one (from the countryside) said "Yeah, so?"
I'm guessing detailed mapping has been removed to stop the somewhat wilder American patriot citizens from planning their own assault on North Korea, given that they probably think Obama's decision not to start World War III (at least not quite yet) shows that he's a lilly-livered yellow-bellied pacifist.
Seriously though, this is a bit odd - why have Google done this? Maybe it's to stop NK officials from easily looking at maps of their own country - but then the satellite views would have to go too. Bizarre.
Paris, because she's always visible via Google... more so when you disable SafeSearch.
Google preparing for next friday, after North Korea foolishly lobs a nuke into Japan/South Korea on Thusday afternoon, and the US/Russians/Chinese blank North Korea from the map Thursday evening.
Then many North Koreans will be able to travel the world as they drift down out of the fallout
PS Wheres the Mushroom cloud icon?
That there did used to be maps? Given western cartographers arent likely to have been welcomed in at any point in the last 50 years, I can't see that the maps wouldve existed in the first place. It's more likely they were never there than that they've been pulled.
Even tourist mecca Cuba is largely blank on the map front beyond place names an major roads.
Hmm, I also think Google Maps has always been blank for North Korea. "Censored" is right about cartographers being most unwelcome: visitors must hand-over any GPS devices to customs on arrival, or risk trial! But you can download older editions of US (1950s) and Soviet military maps (mid 1980s) from lots of places on the web.
(US 1:250,000) http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/ams/korea/ from the
(US 1:50,000) http://www.koreanwar.org/html/korean_war_topo_maps.html
(Soviet 1:200,000) http://poehali.org/maps , Russian interface
The icon is for unwary Western geocachers :-(