Several months ago, I showed you the new Street View feature on Google Maps.  It allows you to look at 360-degree panoramic views from city streets across the nation.

The company just added those street-level views for Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill.   Just look up an address, click on the "Street View" button, then click on the icon.  You can use your mouse to click and drag to look around the panoramic view.  To look at a different street, click on the orange man, then drag him to one of the blue-outlined streets.

For an example, here's a look at WRAL's building on Street View.

Of course, many people are concerned about privacy.  The Street View feature includes images from just about every street in the area -- including neighborhoods and homes.  Indeed, pictures of almost every building in the county (along with lots of additional information) is available on Wake County's Web site.  Most opponents are concerned about seeing faces and license plates on the street-level images. 

Google points out that these are pictures taken from public streets.  Also, these are not live images; they're captured whenever the Google truck rolls down the street.  We don't know how often the company plans to update their images. 

Google wants to have Street View images for all over the world, but they're starting with major cities right now.  You can browse through streets for 23 U.S. cities.  The Tufts University newspaper says homeland security concerns have delayed street-level views of Washington, DC.