A quick and dirty way to generate higher resolution background meshes from Google Earth when positioning SketchUp models for export to KML. (Note, the Mac version of the KML exporter works differently for me, and is still a bit too buggy for mainstream use.)
Cartographypoints to another use of Google Earth in the service of environmentalism — Greenpeace outlines all the world’s intact forest landscapes. In ESRI Shapefiles too.
We knew Keyhole got funding from In-Q-Tel, a CIA-funded venture capital firm, before Google bought it. A Slashgeo commenter notes that @Last, makers of SketchUp, got the same treatment, as blogged by All Points Blog, who runs by some more names funded by In-Q-Tel. Randall Newton at AECNews.compoints to a long list of past In-Q-Tel investments.
Alan Glennon at Geography 2.0raises some very interesting points about the pitfalls of having too much data, in the context of Declan’s article about sensor webs in Nature. Often, the hardest part is deciding what data to ignore, and the more data you have, the harder it gets.
Directions Magazine‘s Adena Schutzberg and Joe Francica divine the future of the nature of the competition between Google and Microsoft. Conclusion: “We are just a short hop away from a major disruption in the geospatial market.”
Alan Glennon perseveres through an LA Times article with little to commend it to find a nugget of Microsoft news at the end that is worth a mention: “[Steven Lawler, general manager of Windows Live Local] said that these [bird’s-eye] views covered areas where about 20% of the U.S. population resided and that it would be up to about 90% in two years.” (Thanks Alan)
Glenn at GISuserlaments how websites will use any excuse to put “Google Earth” in headlines in order to garner more traffic. Like this very post, for example.
Notes on the political, social and scientific impact of networked digital maps and geospatial imagery, with a special focus on Google Earth.