Grand Larseny

Google Earth version 5.0 was released today for across all end-user operating systems. What is most striking to me is the fact that in just a few short years, this app has gone from being the most remarkable program running on my machine to an interesting note in the history of maps applications.

Today I have Google Earth on my iPhone, minus some features. After having the whole world in your pocket on the train, having to sit at a desk to zoom in on the crowds at the Eiffel Tower seems impossible. If the functionality that Google Earth provides is not with you when you need it, it is useless. It’s neat to view the oceans, but I live on the land.

After a brief courtship phase with the promo video and David Lee Songsmith, Songsmith is finally being used to destroy the memories of your childhood and replace them with Picasso inspired chimera.  You can blame the internet, again, for mixing the vocal tracks with very weird musical backing instruments on all sorts of songs from years past.  Everything from the Beatles, to the Police, to Oasis has been broken.

I’ve added some YouTube videos in the rest of the post as exhibits A-D.  More examples are available at TechCrunch and Gizmodo.

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