Finally some really nice Virtual Earth goodness now with the 6.2 release of the Virtual Earth Control.  While the mobile support looks nice… it is something I don’t have a use or need for.  But, a lot of the other features are quite nice:

New landmark hints in routing. Customers in the U.S. and Canada can now use maps that feature familiar landmarks, such as gas stations and fast-food restaurants, called out by name.

That makes so much more sense when reading directions and is something people have used for a very long time when giving directions.

New imagery metadata. Users can now find out the relative age of a given image, which will help them assess if the imagery is still relevant to their needs.

Will be interesting to see how this differs from Google’s approach (you can view a location and still not be sure what data source and date you are looking at).

New imagery. Find locations that come to life, with richer bird’s eye and 3D imagery of more locations in cities across North America.

Always a plus to see (also means more new imagery in WorldWind… just need to get the bird’s eye working now)

Weather integration. Bring your 3D maps to life by featuring near real-time local weather and cloud formations.

This is something I want to try out.. but I am also wondering what this will do to the computer resources as well.  It does not look like it uses imagery, it just goes by what the forecast for the region says.. if it is reported at being cloudy then generic clouds would be rendered.  But still it looks like a nice eye candy feature.

These are just some of the features that I think look the most interesting.  To see the full list check the MSDN post out.

You can try out the SDK and read more on the Virtual Earth Dev site and try out the SDK here.