Baidu Launches Street View Maps, Beijing Still Has Soso

Another web service has jumped on the bandwagon to offer people the street view navigation of Chinese cities that Google can't. We're just waiting for them to turn their cameras on Beijing.

Baidu announced Thursday that their map service has more than 200 million views, and in light of this, they launched Baidu Total View, according to a Tech in Asia report on Friday. Their totality of coverage means just parts of Shenyang, Wuxi, and Fenghuang, unlike this very thorough map service that has traveled as far as the Forbidden City and the Great Wall.

Some are saying that this could be "China's answer to Google Street View," and that "Baidu is probably working on expanding it."

It's thus difficult to say whether this could mean some streamlined navigating for Baidu map users in Beijing soon. There's also no talk about developing this service in English, though we expect that's way down the line.

Photo: Baidu Total View