Microsoft must really feel under pressure with the current growth of Google, well, it is not like i care. But really, it is totally not like Microsoft to implement such things, where has the Lame Microsoft gone?!. Anyway, enough of crap from me, back to the topic. Right now, it's seems that every major search engines are having their own Maps feature, which was popularized by Google. You may visit the maps search feature served by Microsoft by clicking on this link: Windows Live Maps. I didn't notice any breakthroughs there (maybe i don't want to), but i can't help noticing the application that complement Windows Live Maps, it is called Virtual Earth. Virtual Earth Just as the name implies, it is an application which you can use to virtually view the cities that you wanna visit in 3D, looks like this is Microsoft's smoking gun to counter the existence of Google Earth. I tried to test Virtual Earth for myself, but unluckily for me, it doesn't support my Windows language (i am using a German version of Windows). But there is a site, that gave a view of the functions and features of Windows Live Maps, which includes Virtual Earth, you may view it using this link: Intro to Live Maps ~Snapshot from the site - click for larger image~ This site is a bit funny, in case if you click any of the links at the site doesn't stop loading, please refresh the page, and try clicking on the link again, it worked for me :). Anyway, from what this presentation showed, Virtual Earth looks pretty impressive. Though it supports only English version of Windows (i am guessing) and has only a few cities available to be viewed in 3D, but it is still cool. So sad that i can't test it for myself :( I really hope this current drastic improvements made by Microsoft will not just stop here, rivalry and competition between search engines are always good, at least it is good for us :) . Since i can't test Virtual Earth for myself, please inform me how you think about it, if you have tested it, please !!! :) p/s: the image was 'stolen' by me from a site, the original link is: Search Engine Roundtable