Google Earth

Google helps you keep up with the Olympics

These days, Google isn’t just a search engine, though of course google.com is the starting point for most online searches. As Dylan Casey points out on the Official Google Blog, Google has now made it easier than ever for users to keep up with the Olympics online. In my most recent post, I linked to the various places where you can watch the Olympics online. Casey extends your options — and then some.

The 2008 Summer Games on Google, available in 66 countries and 31 languages, features event schedules and updates on results. You can even track medal counts with an iGoogle gadget. The Summer Games Google Maps is a nifty mashup that allows you to “view medal and event information based on your favorite regions and sports.”

There’s even  a 3D video of the different venues you can tour, embedded below:

The Google Mobile Team also has a post up that explains how to follow the Olympics on your phone.

Just head over to http://www.google.com/m/summergames and enjoy.

Thanks, Google!

The House That Gates Built: Satellite Photos of Bill’s House

Have you been to 1835 73rd Ave NE, Medina, WA? If you didn’t recognize the address, that’s the location of the 48,000 square foot home of Melinda and Bill Gates. We’re still holding our breath for an invitation ourselves.

If by chance you haven’t visited the home of Microsoft’s chairman yet, Amit Agarwal has posted a photo gallery of the Gates mansion, along with a number of links to virtual tours, facts and figures about this rather unique home.

If you haven’t already entered those coordinates, you can zoom into Google Maps or, as Bill would no doubt prefer, MSN Virtual Earth to see more yourself.

The house boasts such 21st century features as adaptive climate control, lighting and music that match the personal preferences of visitors as they move around the house, keyed to a microchip issued to each as they enter. We can’t help but wonder what would happen if a Brazilian and Norwegian entered a room at the same time. There are other features that are less “gee-whiz” but no less extraordinary, including wooden walls made from recycled heavy timber. In fact, Bill Gates funded the first heavy-timber-recycling sawmill in the world for the purpose.

Downsides? Even with energy savings gained from building into the hill, heating that much space and powering all of those screens and electronics is no walk in the park. A cool $1 million dollar annual property tax bill is a bit of a barrier to the light of wallet as well.

Still interested? Perhaps you should found your own software company!

“Google Election?”

As former Speaker of the U.S. House of Represenatives Tip O’Neill once said, “All politics is local.” Perhaps with that in mind, the Google Earth Blog has announced that Google Earth has geared up for future U.S. elections by adding “U.S. Elections Guide” and “U.S. Congressional Districts” information layers. Once you’ve downloaded the most recent version of Google Earth, you’ll be able to select layers that will display the boundaries of voting districts, local polling places, campaign finance data, links to candidates Web sites, news and other information related to the election. The layers are not available through Google Maps, so you’ll have to have access to a PC able to run Google Earth. (Hat tip to Slashdot.org and Greg Sterling at SearchEngineWatch.com.)