ANN ARBOR ? Enlighten Ventures has launched a new web site that combines Google Street View and crowdsourcing to give users a virtual time machine to show what once occupied a parcel of land on which a home, office or restaurant not sits.
The web site, WhatWasThere.Com, provides a platform for capturing the history of everyday places before that history disappears, said Steve Glauberman, founder and CEO of Enlighten, the digital agency that serves as the parent company of Enlighten Ventures.
“Like Wikipedia, WhatWasThere.com employs the knowledge and participation of users across the Internet to create something that benefits everyone?individuals, historical societies, libraries, schools and universities alike,” he said.
Users can participate in the project by uploading any photograph that they can tie to a city, from their childhood homes to the hotels, libraries, museums, theatres, shops, churches and schools that may have served as the backdrop to their lives. All uploaded images will be preserved online as part of a community-curated visual history.
Anyone who browses the site, which offers free and open access to all users, can fade between a historical photograph and the current Google Street View to experience the evolution of place over time. For those who want to explore vintage photos on-the-go, the WhatWasThere iPhone app offers an “augmented reality” experience of the site?s data by layering the historical photos on top of the iPhone’s camera view.
Enlighten hopes that by inviting users to upload their own photographs, WhatWasThere ultimately will grow to become the largest database of geographically tagged historical photographs in the world. The platform already features data from Ann Arbor, Detroit, New York, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, and Philadelphia; and other cities are being added or enhanced daily. Additional features and improvements will be introduced in the months to come.
“This site provides a great opportunity to connect young and old as they place or browse historic photos,? Glauberman says. “It’s a fun and interactive online experience, but above all it provides real social value as a reference to our ever-evolving geographic landscape.?
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