Facebook takes over Swedish mapping start-up Mapillary

Social media giant Facebook has acquired the Swedish mapping startup Mapillary and is venturing into the street level maps game. According to Mashable, Mapillary announced in a company blog post on June 18 that it had been acquired by Facebook. Mapillary CEO Jan Erik Solem didn't give any financial details about the acquisition but noted that things would not change much for Mapillary users. For the unversed, Mapillary solicits photo uploads from regular folks in order to build out a highly detailed street level map of the world. Its functions are similar to what Google Maps, but you can upload your own photos instead of waiting for a Google van to drive around your neighborhood. People who make their own mapping software can use Mapillary's data for their own purposes, too. As per the blog post by Mapillary, the data would remain open and free to use for both commercial and non-commercial purposes, so it doesn't seem like Facebook is walling it off yet. However, It's not entirely clear what Facebook intends to do with the Mapillary platform.