As if you didn't need something to take up your time this weekend, as I just found out via the Google Maps Mania blog that Google released a version of Google Sky via a Web interface yesterday, much like Google Maps.

You can display the sky in visible light, infrared, microwave, and more. You can also select from image categories to see what celestial objects look like from orbiting telescopes. If you want the full multimedia experience, listen to an Earth & Sky podcast too.

But, boy, you need to be patient for all the stuff to load. And it seems to get confused if you move around too quickly and change settings. "No imagery" errors were frequent, and to fix the appearance, sometimes you needed to zoom in, not out. And as with Google Earth, the sky still has problems near the poles. Like my reactions to earlier incarnations of Google Sky: it's a good start! It needs some touch-up though.

And durn it all! What a day to forget to bring my iPod touch to work! I want to see how it works on that.