Google Maps, Earth and John Udell's Screencast

Jon Udell's screencast using Google Maps to give a tour of his neighbourhood created a stir online about the use of this technology when integrated with a handheld GPS. It's also a nice example of a screencast, the medium that Steve Clift used to provide his virtual tour of GroupServer.

Of course, Google Earth has just lifted the bar a jump. It provides a spinning globe where you can zoom in for a near ground-level virtual tour with links plucked live from Google and other databases providing almost the intimacy of Jon Udell's commentary.