Google just released the next version of their Keyhole software. It's called Google Earth, and of course it's a beta release.

I first heard about Keyhole last October when Google bought Keyhole Corporation. I use Keyhole LT the non-professional version of the Keyhole software and it's a fascinating piece of software that allows you to view satellite imagery in an intuitive way.

Although it seems likely that the satellite images in Google Maps use some of this technology, Keyhole takes it a few steps further. For one thing, Keyhole is a whole lot smoother than Google Maps imagery because it's an application that runs on your PC and renders the images locally, essentially distributing this task out to the end-user's computer.

The application starts with view of the whole Earth floating in space.

Read more: Windypundit