Google Lets You Time Travel — to 2007

Google Maps viewers can now travel in time -- to 2007, when Google Maps began snapping images -- and see how things used to be and are now.

Some venues are more interesting than others, such as the Freedom Tower in New York City, which has grown in the last few years. If a Google Maps image has a clock on the upper-left of the photo, then it can be clicked on and users can take a short trip through time, according to the Official Google Blog.

"This new feature can also serve as a digital timeline of recent history, like the reconstruction after the devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Onagawa, Japan. You can even experience different seasons and see what it would be like to cruise Italian roadways in both summer and winter," wrote Vinay Shet, Google Street View product manager.

The view does help if you can't remember what things looked like seven years ago, but for those of us that do, it's likely the Google service will be more interesting in 20, 30 or even 100 years from now.

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