[KLUG Advocacy] Freaky / Interesting experience with yahoo maps

[John Bridleman]

* greenproc (greenproc at charter.net) wrote:
> >>When looking up directions to a location within downtown kalamazoo, I
> >>specified the street and zip of the location along with just the zip for
> >> my "from" location at <maps.yahoo.com>.
> > 
> I was not logged into maps.yahoo.com; perhaps you are referring to
> 'personalized preferences' at work here -- this is not the case.  I do
> have a yahoo account, and I am logged into their im service using gaim.
>  I never provided any sort of personally identifying information to them
> -- if they have my address it is ill gotten from data-mining techniques
> and/or unauthorized information sharing from 3rd parties.
> 
> I would be very much interested to see others perform the same "test"
> and report their findings.  Thanks.

I logged out of my Yahoo account and tried it. It picked the center of the city as the end point.
--
John Bridleman / www.bridleman.org