News 

Google Earth already displays images from the Panoramio - its photos have been a default layer in Google Earth since the beginning of the year - using location data entered by the site's users. The site also provides an API that enables web developers to embed its functionality into their own websites.

In a brief statement on its homepage,

'Today, we are pleased to announce the planned acquisition of Panoramio by Google,' it said. 'This acquisition is a great opportunity for Panoramio uploaders to leverage Google's reach, increasing the exposure of their photographs to photophiles around the world and for viewers to choose from a larger universe of photographs as Panoramio becomes more widely known.'

In true Web 2.0 fashion, Google announced the takeover in its blog.

John Hanke, director for Maps, Earth and Local said that images layer in Google Earth would remain in place 'as our teams work together toward further integrating this amazing content, generated by many, into our mapping technologies.'

Panoramio is not alone in enabling geotagging of images to link them to maps and satellite images. Yahoo!, for one, offers a similar service to users of its Flickr website.