Google has announced plans to acquire photo-sharing service Panoramio for an undisclosed amount. Based in Spain, Panoramio enables users to plot their photos on the earth using Google Maps and Google Earth, and let other users view them based on location. The companies have been working together for over a year; Google has already integrated data from Panoramio into a browseable data layer in Google Earth, which in turn helped Panoramio’s database grow to more than a million images.
Google says it plans to integrate Panoramio’s technology and services more deeply into its products as well as build out Panoramio’s infrastructure; users shouldn’t see any immediate change in Panoramio’s operation. Panoramio is giving its existing users an option to remove their images and personal data before the material is transferred to Google.
The move is generally seen as a boost to Google’s photo-sharing portfolio, which has historically been far behind that of rival Yahoo, which owns the popular photo sharing service Flickr. Flickr users can also map their photos on Google Earth, but the images don’t appear as a default data layer.
