Google Earth was released for free last week. After having bought technology from Keyhole, Google has released a basic version of the Google Earth software for free without any recurring charges. There are enhanced versions available for different needs that feature better satellite images and higher quality printing.

Even in its basic form, the Google Earth software can be used in many different ways, and is highly customizable. Check out this website [snotmonkey.com] for addon files that can be used to really show off this software’s abilities.

It is still a beta so I guess a lot of features would be added on later, but imagine being able to search for people using the software with only their names or phone numbers. That would be truly mind-boggling. Then, imagine implanting a “geo-tracking” chip inside every human on earth, and being able to pull up their location in real time. We could catch criminals so easily ! Ofcourse, different users would be given a different access level based on their role in society, but in theory this system should be able to curb crimes.

I will have a drink to Google’s success tonight. Let’s hope it changes the cyberscape for the better…