Pubic alerts
"wrote Google pubic alerts engineer Steve Hakusa in a blog post"
I just *knew* this typo would be in the article ;-)
Google tried to claw back the moral high ground on Wednesday by adding a new emergency alert service to its popular mapping tool, designed to give the public up-to-the-minute information on serious weather, public safety and earthquake-related events. At the moment, the new feature is only available in the US, however. In a …
Because that require people to visit and enter their details into two sites, Google combine the data into one site so now people can visit just one site and get that information. Eventually Google is hoping more national organisation will offer over their data to Google, enable Google to combine data of potentially hundreds if not thousands of sources into this service.
Plus if you got a Google account you do not have to enter in any details.
I've never had to enter personal details into NOAA or USGS.
On top of that, I almost^W never need weather *AND* geological info superimposed on each other.
This is yet another way for google to pull personal information from individual IP addresses. I shun google at all costs. They are a slow-motion train wreck waiting to happen.
NWS is an agency of NOAA, so the list is sort of like listing El Reg, El Reg comments, and The Onion.
You should also check on the map source, it is more likely the US Geodetic Survey, which is also an agency of NOAA. Many people make that mistake. I got caught on it myself yesterday even though as an NWS contractor with a friend who works in the Geodetic area, I should know better. Geodetic are the people who measure it down to the 0.5 cm and revise the supercomputer globe models every 4 years.