Google Earth

For those of you who haven't played around with Google Earth - brief intro:

Google Earth is software that allows you to view sattelite images of the earth. You can drag the earth around, zoom in/out, change your angle of view and measure distances. Non-free versions have added features such as GPS.

What is really cool is the different layers that you can experiment with. To illustrate: If you select the "Borders" layer, you'll see all the country borders in yellow.

What I'm raving about is the newest additions: National Geographic Layers. This basically links specific spots on earth to specific nature articles and images. You also get access to high-resolution arial images of interesting natural phenomenon, and the coolest part: Live-wildcams situated in Africa, South America etc can be easily located and viewed.

There are also "overlays" available of natural disasters such as hurricane katrina. BTW - an interesting blog on what's going on in the gulf.

It's a real pity this kinda stuff wasn't around when I was at school. This should take geography to a completely new level. Imagine using Google Earth in 20 years time...I reckon you'll be able to view the whole earth in realtime...and this will in all likelihood not be restricted to terra firma only!(footprints)

What other applications for this technology do you envisage?