Various methods, systems and apparatus for displaying content associated with a point-of-interest (“POI”) in a
digital mapping system, are disclosed. One such method may include detecting a change in the
zoom level of an
electronic map displayed on a computing device, determining if the new
zoom-level is at a pre-determined
zoom level (e.g. at maximum zoom), identifying a POI on the map, retrieving content associated with the POI (“POI content”) and displaying the POI content. A POI may be a specific point of interest; or, an entire geographic region of a map displayed at a high zoom level. The method may further include detecting a change in the zoom, or pan, of the digital map while POI content is displayed, and removing or repositioning the POI content in response. One apparatus, according to aspects of the present invention, may include means of detecting a change in the zoom level in a digital map displayed through an application (e.g. a
web browser, an application on web-enabled cellular phones, etc., displaying a map generated by a service such as Google Maps®, Yahoo! Maps®, Windows Live Search Maps®, MapQuest®, etc.) on a computing device (e.g.
personal computer,
workstation,
thin client, PDA, cellular phone /
smart phone, GPS device, etc.) means of identifying a POI at the pre-determined zoom level, means of obtaining content associated with the POI, and means of displaying the POI content. POI content may be retrieved from a
database (e.g. internet-based
database); or, in an alternate embodiment, gathered by
crawling websites associated with the POI. In one embodiment, POI content may be displayed as an image (e.g a PNG file, GIF, Flash® component, etc.) superimposed on the digital map (e.g. as an
overlay object on the map image.) In alternate embodiments, POI content may replace the digital map and may contain links to other content.