Friday, January 19, 2007

Google Earth for Something Good

Google Earth is a rather nifty product, and Google continues to update it with new features, no doubt more is coming with its NASA deal.

Certainly it has come under fire, like Google Maps, for providing a means by which terrorists and other angry people can locate government installations in an effort to destroy them. Or even find the dwellings of celebrities in order to better stalk and harass them. There are probably plenty of articles and blogs on the Internet related to that particular topic.

But Google Earth also gets used in the corporate world. I've seen it used on the Weather Channel and on CNN, providing a more enhanced image of areas I would not otherwise see.

And then there is this, which I originally found on Digg and found absolutely fascinating. We've heard year in and year out about the destruction of the Amazon rain forest. I can remember sitting in science classes in grade school and hearing about the destruction and looming danger because the Amazon produces a fair amount of oxygen for the planet.

The destructiveness never quite registered in my brain until I saw those images.

So Google Earth can, in fact, be used for something good and bring a more concrete understanding to something we have more than likely tuned out by now.

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