There is an article on PC World entitled Gates Unveils MSN Virtual Earth which describes upcoming releases from MSN that were recently announced by Bill Gates at a recent event. Excerpts from the article are provided below

Microsoft's MSN division will enhance its search engine in the next couple of weeks by adding a local search index for finding business directory listings. Later, the company will supplement this with MSN Virtual Earth, a free new service that will pinpoint places in maps and satellite images.   Local search is a gaping hole in the MSN search engine. All other major search engine providers, including Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, and America Online, have a local search tab on their search Web sites. As part of its local search service, Google also provides maps and satellite images, offering functionality that is similar to what Microsoft is aiming for with MSN Virtual Earth.
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In addition to complementing MSN's local search index, MSN Virtual Earth will let users overlay maps and satellite photos in order to create hybrid images that combine the best of both mediums, says Stephen Lawler, general manager of Microsoft's MapPoint unit.

MSN Virtual Earth will also be integrated with users' preferred e-mail application and, with a single click, will place links in e-mail messages to maps and images, says Steve Lombardi, a MapPoint program manager. Users will also be able to post images to their MSN Spaces Weblog from within the MSN Virtual Earth interface, Lombardi says.

Users will be encouraged to provide feedback on business directory listings so that the MSN local search service will be able to give users a sense of what a particular area is like, Lawler says.

MSN Virtual Earth uses technology from MapPoint and from Terra Server, a database of satellite images Microsoft has had for about ten years, the officials say.

I was in a meeting with Steve Lombardi and a couple of other folks from the Virtual Earth team a while ago and they definitely have built a compelling product that they are quite passionate about. As mentioned in the article, there are interesting avenues for integration with other MSN properties such as MSN Search and MSN Spaces.

It's great to see the innovation and competition coming out of the online mapping space. 

Update: There is an interview with the Virtual Earth team complete with demos up on Channel 9.