New satellite lets Google, Pentagon keep better tabs on you
Commercial satellite imaging company GeoEye launched its first satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base in southern California on Saturday. GeoEye 1's camera gear packs a scary 16-inch resolution from orbit. (That's for black and white images. Color photos will have 5.5-foot resolution.) The $500 million satellite is partly funded by the Department of Defense, despite the Google logo on the side of the launch rocket.A Google spokesman said Sergey and Larry "look forward to getting some real quality, high-resolution imagery into Google Earth" in three to four months — presumably enabling close-ups in areas not trespassed by Google's Street View trucks. But with Google and the DOD sharing a satellite, the tinfoil-hat theories start now.