NASA has released a number of free programs that may be of interest to educators, including one called World Wind. This is essential a virtual globe composed of satellite imagery that you can spin, tilt, zoom, and enhance with digital elevation data. Layers such as boundaries and place names can be turned on and off.

The program requires 2 GB of hard drive space and a high speed Internet connection. It is NOT a program to be run on an older computer. The program download is 128 MB and requires Microsoft.NET (another 28 MB and also free) and DirectX runtime (also free) to run.

This is an impressive free program though it is difficult to navigate and control what appears on screen. Though the surface can be enahnced using SRTM elevation data, in some areas this was non-existent. The program has much potential (a flyby creation tool would be helpful) and is of interest to geomatics professionals and educators.

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Google released Google Maps this spring and has since added on a satellite mapping feature. Since Google Maps runs on xml and its source is open, users can alter and customize it to their own purposes, resulting in some interesting results.

FoundCity allows users to entire in their own locations of interest and add to existing customized Google Maps. Still looks pretty new, considering the narrow focus and the number of sites on some of the maps. A little more developed is a rental and real estate listing. Vancouver is the only Canadian city listed so far but I'm sure that will change in the near future. MonkeyHomes uses Google Maps as a back drop to New York City subway station stops.

Looking to do some virtual sightseeing? Google Sightseeing picks out some of the more interesting sights in the world as seen by satellite. Another site also lists some popular sightseeing destinations. Someone else has taken the Google Maps satellite image sightseeing approach and personalized it to the extreme. Perhaps a little frightening? But Google Maps - satellite view is not at this stage yet (fortunately)!

Keep posted! There are mre variations sure to come. Let us know if you see any.

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Buzztracker.org hosts a daily map of the locations of GoogleNews stories.


If you click on the About Buzztracker link, there are some interesting maps of the SARS story over a number of day. For the most part, it doesn't look like much happens in the world that doesn't happen in China, the United States, the Middle East and Europe. Makes you wonder about the bias of Google News. But then, I suppose it's just the bias of the Internet itself.

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