wow. A9 just got a whole lot better. The block views (you can “walk” down streets in major U.S. cities as well as search for businesses and jobs(?)) are now very neatly integrated with two maps, and it’s all very easy to navigate and wonderfully quick even on my ancient computer. And it’s impressive that this one is not using google maps 
Oh man. I just found Elgg, a sort of friendster/facebook for geeks and nerds. They call it a “learning landscape” and it’s a web community as well as an open source project (you can download the elgg platform onto your own server if you wish.) It’s blogs (private or public), tags, file sharing, communities and groups, wikis, all sorts of keyword connections and who knows what else. If I continue feeling nerdy, I might actually try this out, because, I have to admit, this might be sort of genious if it works.
A downloadable tool by the Compendium institute offers a way of organizing thought, teamwork, fiction, art, conflict resolution, or whatever else into an interactive visual map. I’m about to download and test it, and will post my review within the next couple days.
All sorts of uses of Google maps are continuing to pop up. One of my favorites right now is by Oodle, integrating the maps into a very comprehensive classifieds search engine.
Another recent addition in the map world is MSN’s Virtual Earth. I hate to say it, but it does have some neat features that Google doesn’t. For example, MSN actually offers an impressively detailed map of Europe and an almost decent map of Africa — these maps are still missing roads or any other infrastructure, but they do show even minor cities. And there’s more, like the ability to show your location on the map based on your IP address (i think).
