Where's Waldo moves to Google Earth.

This is probably the best thing to kill my productivity for the next few days. I need to reschedule a few meetings.

For years, he has challenged enterprising schoolchildren everywhere to spot him among ancient Aztec kingdoms and medieval battlefields.

But now Wally has set his fans a new goal - to find him over the internet.

Canadian artist Melanie Coles has brought her favorite childhood game firmly into the 21st Century by painting a 55ft Wally - complete with red-and-white-striped jumper, glasses and woolen hat - on to a city center roof that can only be seen by Google Earth satellites.

There is now a flurry of interest among Internet users to see who can be the first to spot this Web 2.0 Wally according to Daily Mail.

But competition is likely to be tough. Not only will Wally hunters have to locate his rooftop perch, but they will also have to wait for Google's imaging equipment to pick it up.

Although Google Earth pictures can be up to three years old, the company does not reveal when it plans to update its images.

But, as Miss Coles, 22, insists that's all part of the fun.

She said: 'The goal of the game is to get excited. It's like this huge shift. Radio is going to the Web. Television is going to the Web. And now Waldo is going to the Web, which is pretty fitting right now. This is what I'm surrendering to the Google god.'

Miss Coles, an art student who has publicised her project on the blog whereonearthiswaldo.com, is now encouraging others to follow her lead and create a series of Google Wallys across the world.

'I think that it's within the spirit of the state of the Web now. Everything is a free-for-all, and I think the more Waldos, the better,' she said.

Microsoft Photosynth

Photosynth is an amazing new technology from Microsoft Live Labs that will change forever the way you think about digital photos.

Microsoft software takes a large collection of photos of a place or an object, analyzes them for similarities, and displays them in a reconstructed three-dimensional space.
With Photosynth you can:

• Walk or fly through a scene to see photos from any angle.
• Seamlessly zoom in or out of a photo whether it's megapixels or gigapixels in size.
• See where pictures were taken in relation to one another.
• Find similar photos to the one you're currently viewing.
• Send a collection - or a particular view of one - to a friend.

http://labs.live.com/photosynth/default.html

The program works by analyzing multiple photographs taken of the same area. Each photograph is processed by noting specific features, like the corner of a window frame or a door handle.

Photos that share features are then linked together in a web. When the same feature is found in multiple images, its 3D position can be calculated. Photosynth's 3D model is a cloud of points showing where these features are in space. This model enables the program to show a particular area from various angles, based on the different angles found in the photos. While the process works when only two photographs are used, it is better with more.

This process is known scientifically as photogrammetry.

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