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Thursday October 9, 2008
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What's the next logical step for a company that's been raising eyebrows among privacy groups across the globe? Why, launching the world's highest-resolution commercial satellite, of course.
Google has done just that with the 4,300-pound GeoEye-1. The massive satellite, which moves at 7,000 miles per hour (4.5 miles per second) between the North and South Pole, just snagged its first image--Pennsylvania's Kutztown University.
Don't get too nervous, though GeoEye's VP of marketing told Wired, "This is the opposite of a spy satellite. Spies don't put info on the Internet and sell imagery. We're an Earth-imaging satellite, and we can sell our imagery to customers around the world who have a need to map and measure and monitor things on the ground."
GeoEye-2 is set to launch in 2011 or 2012--by then privacy groups will likely have faster and heavier things to worry about.
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October 9, 2008 10:13 PM
I think at 7,000 miles per hour the satellite is moving about 10,000 miles per hour too slow to stay in Earth orbit.