Microsoft's Virtual Earth is in a continual growth process. At the time being, the general perspective is that Google Earth is a much more elaborate, content-rich and more popular service than Virtual Earth, and while that may very well be the case, the Redmond company has by no means thrown down the towel. In fact, Virtual Earth is expanding from month to month, generally via updates weighing in at double digit Terabytes .
This was the case with the January update introduced to Virtual Earth, which delivered a massive
27 TB of new content. Following the debut of 2008, February brought with it another infusion of imagery, only that this time Microsoft failed to reveal the size of the update.
"The latest monthly update of maps is complete. Highlights include all maps for North America republished with the latest NavteQ street data, new JD Barnes aerial imagery in Canada, and lots of new aerial imagery in India and China. Below is a list of new and expanded Birds Eye and 3D cities as well," revealed a member of the Virtual Earth team.
Chris Pendleton, Virtual Earth Technical Evangelist, has a full list of Oblique Aerial Imagery (Bird's Eye), Orthographic Satellite Imagery and Orthographic Aerial Imagery that has been either added or refreshed via the February 2008 update to Virtual Earth.
Not only this, but Microsoft has also introduced new 3D Cities starting with Vannes, in France, and Southampton in Great Britain. The U.S. was by no means overlooked and here are the new locations available in 3D via Virtual Earth: "Pueblo, Bridgeport, Stamford, Portland, Battle Creek, Grand Rapids, Warren, Springfield, Billings, Trenton, Henderson, Sunrise Manor, Rochester, Syracuse, Allentown, Olympia, Yakima, La Crosse, and Madison."
The video fragment included at the bottom of this article, via James Senior, Microsoft UK Partner Technical Specialist, will give you an idea of what Virtual Earth can do. If you want to experience the real thing, just go here.
Video: Virtual Earth - Bird's eye view and 3D
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