they bought the company Keyhole, which created the world-map interface.. the map info is all public domain satelite photos, but the software makes for a great way to browse the world. We have been using it at work for a while, and i got a copy for home.. it has a whole little culture going too - check out the BBS for keyhole/google earth.

its the shit

An "instant understanging?" Give me a break. Yeah, it's a nice tool, but I think that's taking things a little too far.

looks like the screenshots for Simcity 5. I wonder how it compares with NASA's Worldwind. Anyone try both?

hey yeah i was just about to send you that link. it looks a lot like keyhole actually.

oh...i see its been noted that they 'bought the company keyhole'

Here's a link to the install program -- http://desktop.google.com/download/earth/GoogleEarth.exe

They've actually taken the link off their site temporarily, as they're fiddling with it in beta, but the above link still works. It also installs for me fine, although I've heard some people unfortunately are having problems with it asking for a login.

It's definitely worth checking out -- I never tried the Keyhole program, but as far as I know NASA WorldWind doesn't have any feature of displaying 3d buildings, and this is one of the most useful features of Google Earth.

As a side topic. Check here how to integrate the GPS Tagging of Photos: Flickr, Mappr and Google Earth http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2005/07/how_to_gps_tag.html