I first stumbled on this site over half a decade ago, and it's nice to see it's still going. There's genuine effort to collaborate with locals to produce curated content - see for example the city showcase of Lagos, Nigeria: <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/project/creative-lagos" rel="nofollow">https://artsandculture.google.com/project/creative-lagos</a><p>I unironically think it's Google's greatest contribution to media in the 2010s.
There's a handy tool to download images from there: <a href="https://dezoomify.ophir.dev/" rel="nofollow">https://dezoomify.ophir.dev/</a>
It’s been around since 2011. I think it was one of the earliest examples of “infinite zooming” tiled image websites.<p>(See <a href="https://ghostarchive.org/archive/Igdyv" rel="nofollow">https://ghostarchive.org/archive/Igdyv</a>)
The app is genuinely great: <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/google-arts-culture/id1050970557" rel="nofollow">https://apps.apple.com/us/app/google-arts-culture/id10509705...</a>
Seattle’s “nearby” feature lists usual suspects but also the Rubber Chicken museum at Archie McPhee’s, a defunct “Bad Art Museum,” a selfie museum, an NFT museum, a coffee museum…<p>I’m no fine art snob but this looks like it’s powered by a keyword search result.
The mobile app used to have a feature where you could upload a selfie and it would search for a painting that looked like you. It did a really good job.<p>Not sure if you can do that on the website.
I really like <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/story/QQUBlr8x6YW7Jw" rel="nofollow">https://artsandculture.google.com/story/QQUBlr8x6YW7Jw</a> and <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/nearby" rel="nofollow">https://artsandculture.google.com/nearby</a>. Thanks for posting!
I weirdly remember this being announced when I was an undergrad in 2011, and thinking it would get killed super fast like Wave, which was given to Apache in 2010 - amazing it still exists!
Thanks for the reminder, I'd forgotten about this website. My favorite post on there is "Exploring the Ripley Scroll: A recipe for making the Philosopher's Stone" [0]. Now I'm feeling motivated to make a painting inspired by the Ripley Scroll. There's something so whimsical and delightful about it. I really wonder what the creator was thinking when they were making it. I love all these arcane magic systems.<p>[0] <a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/story/OwXBNEuJqIJzLg" rel="nofollow">https://artsandculture.google.com/story/OwXBNEuJqIJzLg</a>
My only advice beyond what others have said would be to try and archive it. Google has show themselves to be anti-consumer unless they benefit, so I expect they will kill this as well.<p>Also, in case someone wants to give
me crap, If someone gave me traffic numbers and such so that I know what to expect, I would absolutely be willing to mirror this provided I can find it, and unlike Google, for me, fund != profit. If you work at Google and are confused, please just do a search on Duck Duck Go for the Google graveyard and find a sane job after you realize your current job will end soon.