The mother of all mashups

Civ IV powered by Google

Yeah, the fate of all good technology is either to turn into a dating site or a videogame (sometimes both) and it’s only a matter of time before people start using Google Earth and Google Maps as the backdrop for videogames. It’s only logical, given the plight of sim games like .

But can you imagine — what if were powered by Google Earth? And in real time, the things going on in the world affected your gameplay. I mean, wow.

Surely it’s only a matter of time before such games are ported from military simulations into real games.

. . .

In other news, incoming flights are on red alert and, oh yeah, the Army has a blog. A real gem:

I love science fiction and when science actually catches up to fiction, I’m always excited about it. This could be a great defensive weapon and, of course, offensive. Could you imagine if this [system to use mirrors to shoot laser beams] was working at the start of the Iraq war? We could have sat back a little, let Osama or one of the other most wanted poke their head out and then hit them with a laser and very likely have no collateral damage. Of course the most exciting use is to knock down incoming missiles.

Of course. But the thought that we could be fighting Bin Laden and co. like it were a game of “bop the terrorist” sure is funny! LOL.

(smacks head)

Author: Chris Messina

Head of West Coast Business Development at Republic. Ever-curious product designer and technologist. Hashtag inventor. Previously: Molly.com (YC W18), Uber, Google.

One thought on “The mother of all mashups”

  1. Bruce Sterling wrote about this very game in “Islands in the Net”, but remember the name for it, but it always sounded great.

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