Google officially changes the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America on Maps
After announcing it would be renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, Google has officially changed on its Maps application.
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The change reflects Google's policy of adhering to official government names for geographical locations.
OK, so why am I seeing Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America) from Canada?
Same here in Europe.
This is highly irregular for several reasons:
Google adheres to official government positions, yes, but as far as I'm aware the American government hasn't made the name change official yet. Members of the government have said that they'd do this, but I don't think this idea has passed any process yet. So then why is Google "updated" their maps?
When Google adheres to official government positions, they are local. In example, when you're in China and look up Taiwan, it'll appear as part of China. In other countries it'll appear as either an independent country or a disputed territory, depending on that government's official position on the matter. What we DON'T see is something like "Taiwan (China)", as Google supposedly has no intention on forcing the policies of one government upon another government, and as far as I'm aware the rest of the world hasn't agreed to changing The Gulf of Mexico to The Gulf of America.
If anyone's interested, here's what it looks like in Europe. The good news: this is the first time I've had to use Google Maps in a loooong time (ignoring embedded maps in other sites). OpenStreetMap is wonderful and there are some superb apps powered by it, including the ever-excellent Organic Maps.
From the Wikipedia for Gulf of Mexico:
While the Interior Department confirmed that the Gulf of America name was effective for U.S. federal agencies, on January 24, the change does not apply in an international context.
If Justin Trudeau gets active on this, you can probably get it to Gulf of Canada (Gulf of Mexico) (Gulf of America).
