Who needs to fly when you have internet?

Google recently has launched Street View for Museums and started the launch of the Art Project http://www.googleartproject.com/museums/hermitage, which features 17 art museums, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art and MoMA in New York, The State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Tate Britain and The National Gallery in London, Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid, the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

Via the Art Project, users can navigate through these museums and check out more than 1,000 works of art by more than 400 artists. From the website, you got to use the zoom tool and admire each art piece as long as you wish. Google also created an annotation feature that lets you toggle between the museum’s interior and particular works of art. Artwork is also supplemented with info panels and YouTube videos.

For those who like to linger in front of pieces, every museum chose one work to be captured using “gigapixel” photo-capturing technology. One can check out these pieces in “microscope view” using Picasa to explore brushstrokes — an awesome addition for aspiring artists looking to learn.

In addition, you can create your own artwork collection, saving views of any piece. You can comment on these pieces and even share the selected works with friends. We can see tools like these being invaluable for students.

This idea allows everyone around the world the experience an environment and view the object without physically being there. However, doesn't it also mean that the sense of "exclusivity" has lost? You get to see something without paying a flight, traveling the world, paying the admission fee? This feature is fantastic for students like me, though. 

Or is this a way for Google to show to the world that they have the technology and power to do things that no one else can? Also, like Google's Webex http://www.webex.com/, a tool for realtime virtual meeting everywhere (3-minute quick tour demo http://www.webex.com/quicktour/mc-enduser/?TrackID=1017644&hbxref=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.webex.com%2F&goid=quick_tour). It seems like we as a society is trending towards an environment where you are there and you are really not, but you can. 

Imagine in the future, there are virtual showrooms of any category where viewers are allowed to enter in and with the help of some kind of sensory device, you are taken into this 3D environment where you can literally feel and touch the products the retailers are selling. -- This may be another daring way for marketers to promote their items to create the surreal experience. 

Note: Some sources are collected from http://mashable.com/2011/02/01/google-art-project/