Debunking Flat Earth Misconceptions
Flat-Earthers noticed “mysterious” wandering vehicles with a Google branding and strange equipment mounted on them. They use the fact as “evidence” that Google Maps does not use satellites to obtain the images. In reality, these vehicles record images for Google Street View. It is impossible for street-level
vehicles to obtain the aerial images used by Google Maps.
Google Maps live traffic works by crowdsourcing. It determines the current traffic by aggregating information sent by many phones carried by many different traveling users.
In February 2020, artist Simon Weckert successfully gamed the system and faked a traffic jam in Google Maps. He did that by pulling a cart full of active phones and walking in the middle of roads. Google Maps system thought there were many slow-moving cars on the road and regarded that as a traffic jam. As a result, during Simon’s operation, an empty road appeared as dark red in Google Maps, as if a traffic jam was ongoing.
Flat-Earthers claimed that it proves that satellites do not exist; possibly because they did not know how the system works. It might be that they previously thought the traffic data was obtained directly from satellite imagery. In reality, satellite navigation systems, like the GPS, is very much involved in the system.
Continue reading “Google Maps Live Traffic and Simon Weckert’s Virtual Traffic Jam”
Google Maps and similar apps use satellite navigation —like the GPS— to determine the location of the device. The apps also utilize cellular data or other data connection to obtain map and route data, which are not part of the GPS or satellite navigation system.
Some flat-Earthers noticed that Google Maps does not fully function when the cellular signal is not available. They concluded that GPS signals are transmitted by cell towers, not satellites. In reality, Google Maps is not GPS. The app uses GPS —and other satnav systems— to determine user location. The maps and route data in the apps are not part of the GPS.
Continue reading “Google Maps, GPS and Cellular Signal Reception”