MSN develops Virtual Earth

Following our feature on the new Google Earth product last month, we felt it only fair to review MSN’s new Virtual Earth product in this issue, as it has recently been released in a beta version. By enhancing its established local search tool, MSN is clearly playing catch-up with Google’s impressive new application.

The basic search functions of MSN Virtual Earth include the usual options to help searches find the type and location of a local business or service and the results generated are now overlaid onto maps and aerial views. However, the aerial images are mostly black and white, falling short of the impressive quality of Google’s offering, plus detailed coverage is currently just for the US.

The advantage of MSN’s product is that it is a web-based application so that you don’t need to download and install a piece of software, which therefore makes it easier to access and use from Internet cafes or other computers that don’t have this program installed. Another good feature of this tool is that the aerial photographs are overlaid with labels for street names or landmarks, and directional arrows for one-way streets are also included to help any route planning with this tool.

A novelty feature on this product is a ‘locate me’ option that attempts to pinpoint the geographic location of a user’s computer through IP address tracking. A more accurate utility that tries to do the same thing can be downloaded as an additional application.

MSN is making clear that this new product is still under development and at the moment it does struggle to compete on the same level as Google Earth. Better images and enhanced functionality are promised for later releases and, as Google and MSN start to square up to each other across different product applications, it will be interesting to see who can ultimately create the most effective and popular products.

If you’d like to know more about getting the best from these local search tools, please contact us for more information.

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