Virtual Earth Available! But does it sensor?

Why does virtual earth sensor, when other satalite image services do not? Go find the capital buliding at http://virtualearth.msn.com. Also go find Area 51, that is sensored too. Google for example does not do that...if they dont have to why do you?

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=las+vegas+nevada&ll=37.240219,-115.811520&spn=0.092182,0.122910&t=k&hl=en

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=las+vegas+nevada&ll=37.407331,-116.232755&spn=0.016484,0.029232&t=k&hl=en

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=las+vegas+nevada&ll=37.388777,-116.209731&spn=0.008244,0.014616&t=k&hl=en

I guess google sensors the capital building too..but not area 51!

And I thought this wouldn't be released until Monday...

Well, doesn't look like it Btw what font does the edit post edit in by default, I like it, for some reason it seems jaggy but very very clear!

You know, virtual earth doesn't show columbus oh, or my suburb . And you know what else, just like google...or mapquest, my area...the streets are all wrong, completely!

Don't know about the streets - seems accurate to me (well, for me anyway).

I'll admit Virtual Earth seems to offer some nifty features. I like the scroll ball, and the scratchpad/etc is very cool. However, what's up with the Location Sensor? (1) Why is it there, and (2) not a very smooth setup (I'd prefer an ActiveX control for IE).

The images seem to load very slowly (though I bet that'll be cleared up soon enough), and because of that the zoom animation (which would be cool) isn't quite so slick.

I'd like to slap MSN Virtual Earth silly for linking the "Drive To/From" links to Mapoint. Come on. Isn't that what Virtual Earth is for?

The zoom control is cool, too. The mouse wheel is very nice, but sluggish. One question - is there any way to hide the controls? Or how about move them around?

To the original poster: I see the White House here. And is this Area 51? (I just typed "Area 51, Nevada" into the location box). I do see there's no close up imagery, however.

Oh - just a note. The large pop-up boxes need some serious work. Sure, they're OK, but the window bar font is too small (and so is the rest of the text). The [X] to close is to small, and hard to see. I'd like a larger bar, and overall, a better box (perhaps copy the top bar with a slightly translucent box, although that might be hard to read).

Overall, quite nice.

I do have to say: Nice help documentation! Very, very nice. Screenshots good.

Oh - minor need. They NEED a something to list current location. I want to know where I am, dammit! Lat/long points would be good, etc. Just give me where I'm currently centered, or where I last searched. So I know I'm in a suburb of San Francisco and not Los Angeles.

Not the white house the capital building! It is actually sensored on google too. But type in "Groom Lake" not area 51. You will see Nevada Test site. And it will magically be blanked out...also that directional indicator...click and hold your mouse on that, and move it in directions.

Is it me or do they use images from about 10 years ago? Not only do they use old images but they are also in black and white. I know it's a beta but why would I want to see old satellite images over new maps? I've seen some really good quality images in the site before the release - I hope they're going to add those.

I noticed the speed/zoom issue earlier as well, but man at least where I'm at (Washington, IL) the speed just picked up bigtime here in the last 20 mins. it's flying now, it's just taking time to get everything loaded and propagated...probably why they went live tonight, so that by Mon. when the announce it, it will be ready to go at full speed.

Many of the satellite images that are on file are from some time ago. I don't believe that satellites are continuously updating these images, as the United States most likely has these satellites put to intelligence gathering purposes.

As for the blurring of the Capital building, I was going to say that it was due to the risk of terrorism, but then why wouldn't the White House be blurred as well? Perhaps they've blurred the Capital building because of the fact that there are so many government officials there with no efficient means of evacuation when compared to the White House?

Channel 9 will have a video on this at 9:01 p.m. Sunday evening (Pacific Time). Come back then! I'll also have the team watch here.

The scrollwheel even works in Firefox - well done guys! I am glad to see that you're accepting we won't all use IE and no doubt it was a lot of extra work, so thanks

One slight problem, when I zoom in on the UK, trying to see if there is any data for the county where I live, it stops zooming at a certain point but there is no feedback to tell me why (it just looks like it is being very slow).  Some timed non-modal feedback might be nice (i.e. tell me why then disappear, don't expect me to click on anything). Not sure I like Google's idea of doing the zoom but then the images saying 'no data'.

Also, I can double click to my hearts content to zoom in on a point, but there doesn't appear to be a corresponding zoom out available (using clicks to do it).  Maybe [ctrl | shift]+Double Click or something might work?

Only US? No road map or Aerial Photo for Madrid, for example. At least Google maps gives me aerial photos.
The locate me feature is cool, if someone kidnaps you and you have a computer you'll know where you are.
You can also zoom more than in Google Map.

Didn't they promise this 45 degree flyover view? Will that be on later or is it there already and I just can't find it?

Now this makes more sense than this !

In the original Channel9 Video they said the flyover view would be coming later.

I'm very impressed so far.
Compared with Google Maps when looking at the PDC location I think the MSN  images are clearer, and the interface is definitely more sophisticated.



You can even zoom in a bit further with MSN, wheras Google maps is already at the maximum zoom.

The only slight problem was that the zoom in/out animation was rather slow and jerky on my machine. It takes slightly longer to load the tiles from MSN, and a few more failed to load than is usual on Google.

Is there an API for adding your own markers like the Google one?

very often, googlemaps seem to have the better imagery
see
this vs this
or
this vs this

or see my above post