News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Zoom Earth: Website lets you look at live satellite photo... by jjulius on Monday July 20, 2020 @06:59PM (#23902781)
Sure, we can't zoom in, but I thought that this was pretty cool. Yeah we've seen photos of the planet from a distance, but printed maps and Google/Apple/et. al.'s map software condition us to forget about how widespread cloud cover is. So, to me, an "average person", it's interesting to see the world "as-is" right now - the various storms around the world, the fact that the cloud cover near my house is something I only ever think about locally but, upon viewing this, is so obviously part of a much, much bigger system that extends thousands of miles beyond my locale, the neat kind of horizontal "line" of clouds stretching around the planet along the equator, etc.

Yeah, I'm not going to spend a lot of time checking this out, but it's still really neat for a few minutes.

Edit: User qeternity responded to your post as well, and I'll also echo their comment about how seeing this whole planet as something that's minutes old building a strong connection/appreciation is another great point.

Re:Zoom Earth: Website lets you look at live satellite photo... by supernova87a on Monday July 20, 2020 @07:03PM (#23902803)
I mean, at this level, it's not that different from Google Maps satellite view, right? I can see years/months-old imagery there too.