Google has released Google Maps Australia. Here is their official blurb:

Many Australians have used our maps and satellite images, so today we’re especially excited to launch Google Maps Australia. We’ve expanded service to include Australian business listings, driving directions, and support for Google Mobile Maps in Australia.

The next time you’re looking for an address, tiger meat pie in Sydney, cafes in Melbourne, or how to get to the beach, Google Maps can help you find the answer. If you’re at your computer, go to http://maps.google.com.au and start searching — you can type addresses or business searches like [cricket near melbourne] all into the same search box. If you want to access Google Maps on your mobile device, go to http://www.google.com/gmm from your Java- enabled phone or Palm device to get started.

We’ve all been obsessed lately with watching videos on the web. And when we come across something that strikes our fancy, we can’t wait to share it with our friends. That got us thinking: rather than sending multiple emails and IMs to share the video URL, wouldn’t it be nice to have a feature for sharing videos on orkut?

From now on, when you see that crazy video you feel is a must see for all your friends, now you can create your own video playlist on orkut to share with anyone who visits your profile. Just copy the video URL from your favorite YouTube or Google Video hosted videos, and your friends can enjoy watching your top videos through orkut. And because we know your friends will love your videos as much as you do, we’ve added an “Add to my favorites” button that lets you easily make your friend’s favorite videos appear on your list.

So next time you log into orkut, sit back, relax, and break out the popcorn.

Many people come to Google.com to navigate the web, but are you aware that you can use it to navigate the real world as well? Over the past few months, we’ve been hard at work making it easier to find and compare local businesses and services right from the standard web results page

From now on, you’ll see this every time you search for a place, business, or other local information. In addition to providing the basic contact information and map locations for several choices at the top of the page, we also show ratings and provide one-click access to reviews on the search results page so that you can make more informed decisions about where you want to go.

Here are a few specific examples of how you can use Google to search and compare local businesses and services.

Find the location of and driving directions to the Googleplex (or any specific address).
Find and compare Mexican restaurants in Pasadena, CA
Get directions to and read reviews about a local eatery in Pittsburgh.
Find movie showtimes for films that are playing in your neighborhood.
We’re really excited to offer this easier access to qualitative information about local spots. We find the reviews and ratings generated by others in the know to be quite useful when we want to head to a restaurant, catch a movie, or stay at a hotel — and we hope you will too.

Check here for the original post.

Many of us aren’t lucky enough to experience one of nature’s most glorious sights—the beauty of the sunrise—every day, let alone on demand. That is, until today. Now there’s a Google Earth layer that brings the sun’s ascent right to your computer screen, and Google Earth aficionados can also see video vignettes drawn from Discovery HD Theater’s “Sunrise Earth” program.

To view the videos, open Google Earth and select the Sunrise Earth layer under Discovery Networks. Follow the links in the pop-up window to experience the sights and sounds of one of nature’s most beautiful phenomena. Watch dawn rise over Stonehenge, Mayan pyramids, and Buddhist temples as it has for thousands of years. See the Katmai Bears emerge from their seven-month slumber to greet a new day. Witness the sun’s light bringing life to natural habitats around the world, from the forests of Costa Rica and the coast of New England, to the foothills of Turkey and the glaciers of Alaska.

Whether you catch Sunrise Earth on Discovery HD Theater or via Google Earth, you’ll see the world in a whole new light.

According to the Associated Press and Yahoo New, Google will be building a $600 Million data center in North Carolina, that will employ 200+ people in an area hit hard by the loss of textile and furniture jobs.

In return, the state will be giving Google $4.8 million, which is part of a larger $100 million incentive package. Gov. Mike Easley states “this company will provide hundreds of good-paying, knowledge-based jobs that North Carolinas citizens want,” in regards to the near-future project.

From Google’s Official Blog:

At Google, we get excited about making all kinds of information accessible to everyone. The more up-to-date the information, the more valuable it is. This is particularly true in the world of finance; information, and timing of that information, is money. Today, real-time quotes are not freely and easily available on the web. Some websites offer one real-time quote at a time, but typically only after you have enrolled in a service and/or signed a complicated legal agreement. Other sites approach the problem differently and show you streaming delayed data, but that doesn’t solve the problem either — it masks it. What’s really important is getting free, easy and fast access to real-time quotes so you know how the market or your company is doing now, not as of twenty minutes ago.

As a result, we’ve worked with the SEC, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and our D.C. trade association, NetCoalition, to find a way to bring stock data to Google users in a way that benefits users and is practical for all parties. We have encouraged the SEC to ensure that this data can be made available to our users at fair and reasonable rates, and applaud their recent efforts to review this issue. Today, the NYSE has moved the issue a great step forward with a proposal to the SEC which if approved, would allow you to see real-time, last-sale prices across all Google properties including Google Finance, Personalized Google, Mobile, and of course, Google.com. It won’t matter if you’re on Wall Street or Main Street — you’ll have free, easy and fast access to real-time prices from NYSE on Google.

So stay tuned on our progress with this. We’re excited that financial data as we know it is about to change. In the meantime, set up your portfolio on Google Finance today.

Through Google’s Co-op beta program a search engine that is limited to Wordpress Resources has been set up to make it easier to search for blogs and blog tools.

Google. The very name conjures up a world of search engine possibilities and add-ons that have made it the monster it is today. Back in 1999 though, it was still in beta testing and juuuuust creeping into the daily vernacular of online geeks and nerds.

Curious what Google looked like as a baby? Then take a trip into the Way Back Machine to see baby’s first steps. It is amazing what a few years of growing will do.

Are you a young child and need to make sure Santa is making his way to your house?

Maybe you’re a physicist trying to do some analysis on how Santa gets around the world in just one night while dragging every imaginable gift along with him (without losing any of that weight)?

Either way, once again, you can track Santa’s journey from the comfort of your own home.

Google allows you to track him and his sleigh through Google Earth Santa Tracker.

Norad is also doing their traditional tracking, but this year they seem to have teamed up with Microsoft’s Virtual Earth.

Hope Santa brings everyone what they want. And Merry Christmas to all of you readers.

The end of the year has arrived and so has Google’s yearly round up of what we’ve been searching for: Google Zeitgeist 2006

Let’s see here… Most of the stuff in the top ten searches seems pretty normal. Wikipedia still going strong. MySpace is still attracting attention whoring teens and others looking to hook up. Video is still hot. And of course, Bebo tops them all.

Wait… what in the hell is Bebo?

Ah, apparently it’s some kind of social networking MySpace-alike. Well, damn, I feel so out of the loop. I’ve never heard of this place. And it’s based out of San Fran, so I can’t claim ignorance due to it being from out of the country. Maybe I had heard about it and somehow blocked it out of my mind for having such a dumbass name as Bebo.