If there's one city in the U.S. that you might actually want to see a 3D map of, it's probably New York City, because, you know, there's stuff to look at. Des Moines, Iowa, not so much.

But for some reason, when Microsoft launched 3D views of major cities for its Live Maps and Virtual Earth programs, New York was curiously absent. Today, Microsoft is rolling out 3D imagery for New York and other cities including Austin, Cincinnati, Tampa, and Savannah in the U.S, Ottawa in Canada, and Northampton, England.

If you want a sneak peak before downloading Virtual Earth, Search Engine Land points out this movie of the 3D New York imagery in action. In the meantime, Google could be preparing to announce a new "street view" for Google Maps, and the search company is also expected to announce a major expansion of its 3D building rendering for Google Earth.

Bosses everywhere are going to love The Weather Channel. With maps being the number one draw for weather.com visitors, they have teamed up with Microsoft's Virtual Earth to offer users the ability to see real time weather reports for streets in the U.S.

The Interactive Weather Map can be viewed in either a "road view", or a much cooler satellite view, with different color blobs from greens to grays denoting the weather conditions. Want to see the directional path of the weather condition in your area? Check out the animation feature in the lower right corner, this plays a cycle of animated satellite imagery data, perfect for scrubbing through time while you watch storms and weather systems progress.

What does this mean for employees calling in late due to "weather"? Watch out; Your boss can track storm systems right down to the block you're on, so you might want to develop some better excuses.

[via CenterNetworks]

I admittedly don't spend any significant amount of time at Weather.com, but a little birdie who does just tipped us off to a new Interactive Weather Map beta that still has that new feature shine to it. The map offers full drag-able goodness, with the ability to swap between Radar, Clouds and Clouds + Radar coverage. On-the-fly transparency of said coverage is also present, as well as a slow-frame animation for those who want to get their amateur weather man on.

All of this is powered by Microsoft's Virtual Earth, and it is indeed an impressive piece of (beta) work, though I can't find any sort of press release or wiz-bang announcement. Now, if Weather.com could only introduce a new 'Reliable Weather™' option (even an alpha would be fine), we'll be in business.

Microsoft is keeping things interesting in the mapping community by releasing its Virtual Earth online application. Microsoft has actually decided to add in real photographs of buildings, a feature that Google Earth has not yet implemented. Microsoft currently has 15 US cities with the 3D views, and plans to have more than 100 cities by the third quarter of next year. Another difference with Microsoft's new Virtual Earth is the integration of ads in the 3D environment. Not sure how I feel about this integration of virtual billboards yet. Aren't we bombarded with too many ads during the day as it is? Next we're sure to see the time on our watches having hourly sponsors! That aside, the Virtual Earth team has done a nice job with this interesting 3D feature. It's a great way to totally immerse yourself into a kind of realistic flight through your local map searches. Look for a name change in the future as well. The team will be changing the name from Live Local Search to Live Search Maps. Unlike Google Earth, this application runs totally inside the browser with an internet connection, and a special virtual earth setup file. Unfortunately I was unable to test this out yet. The installation bar kept giving me the message that "The installation is taking longer than expected." It's been 20 Minutes so far, and I gave up. Was anyone able to check this out yet?

Microsoft is working hard at beefing up its "Live" service offering. Right now it seems like they have everything under the sun listed in Windows Live. Current offerings include Mail, Messenger, Gallery, Mail Desktop, Q & A, Product Search, and now the Windows Live Hotspot Locator.

The Windows Live Hotspot Locator is actually a nice way to check for WiFi access, both free and paid. Simply visit the site, enter your country, state/ province, zip code, city, a distance radius, and whether you are on the hunt for paid, free, or both types of WiFi access. Windows Live generates a list, complete with address, location name, and who the Hotspot providers are. You can select a location from the list, and get to page dedicated to them showing a Microsoft Virtual Earth map, with pinpointed location. Now if they can only make that list accessible when you arent connected and looking for a connection!

Microsoft has unveilled a technology preview of a new part of its web-based Windows Live Local called Virtual Earth, which includes not only a satellite view like we're used to but also street-level photographs. It's a bit like A9's Block View, but has views in four directions instead of two, and it has a wild driving mode that lets you cruise around the streets like you're actually there. Sort of. It's definitely cool, but at the moment pretty impractical. When "driving" it's hard to stay on the streets and sometimes the views you get are unpredictable. Between this and the 45-degree aerial view that made its debut back in December, Microsoft is definitely up to some very cool stuff with Windows Live Local, but they've got a lot of kinks to work out before it crosses the line from cool into useful. However, in its current state it still might come in handy for people who navigate by landmark. Currently Seattle and San Francisco's city centers are the only areas covered by the photos.