GE = Netscape Navigator?

Stefan at Ogle Earth pointed me to a post by Andrew Hudson-Smith who covers ESRI’s David Maguire demoing ArcGIS Explorer in London. Both of their takes are worth reading, BTW. Hudson-Smith notes this related to the presentation:

Google Earth’s current status was compared to the popularity of the now almost defunct Netscape Navigator which was quickly surpassed by Microsoft Explorer.

I’ll toss into the mix the idea that as ESRI matures its vision for ArcGIS Explorer, it’s also introducing this disruptive technology. It’s making many second guess their decision to implement Google Earth or MSN Virtual Earth or other offerings. This may not be so different from good old ArcCAD which ESRI tossed into the mix knowing that eventually Autodesk would introduce its own CAD-based GIS. ESRI did not prevent this product from emerging, but likely delayed it and kept up confusion in the market for a while. During that time ESRI matured its CAD plans, which involved moving more CAD-like funcationality into ArcView 3.x and now ArcGIS.