Simbad data in Google Sky

[Doug Tody]

On Thu, 6 Sep 2007, Alberto Conti wrote:

> I think that the time to be careful has passed. GoogleSky, for better
> of worse is out there. One needs to decide if this type of interface
> can be used by astronomer and the VO or not. Does this provide a new
> platform to non-astronomers to view astronomical data hosted on VO-
> compliant services? I think so, and VO should consider using this
> tool (and all the others that will come, do I hear WWT?) to do some
> public relations for VO.
> Does GoogleSky also provide a way for professional astronomer to
> enrich their work? I don't think this is the case at the moment and
> GoogleSky does not compare to Aladin in its present form, for many
> many reasons. I believe this step will take much longer, but I was
> proven wrong many times, even with what's possible and what's not in
> GoogleSky, so I am willing to wait before I make up my mind on this
> one till I have more data.

I think this technology has the potential to play a role for Internet-based
graphical interaction, similar to what the Web browser did for documents.
So long as the data provider controls the content, and the "browser"
can call back to services, one could potentially do a great deal with
it (maybe even for real science applications).  The technology is a bit
immature at this point, and open standards are badly needed so we don't
favor one platform over another or get in a vendor lock-in situation,
however that need not prevent us from experimenting with this and helping
to push it along.

	- Doug