World-Heritage-Tour.org - Heritage Sites in 360

It’s not exactly a substitute for the real thing, but it’s a much cheaper alternative to an all out world tour of Unesco Heritage sites. WorldHeritageTour brings you a fully panoramic, 360 view of Heritage sites around the globe. A world map pinpoints regions which can be further explored upon clicking. Each marker in turn stands for a heritage site. Hovering over a marker brings up a pop-up preview of the panorama. Each site is color coded to signify its status on both Unesco’s list and the WMF(World Monuments Fund) watch list. The list still isn’t complete however with only 216 of 851 sites mapped. Despite that, there are a few noteworthy features to keep you busy. The photos can be viewed in Quicktime or Flash; pressing the control and shift keys allows you to zoom in and out; dragging the mouse allows to see the whole 360 panoramic vista. There’s also a print mode version available—however you do need to sign up to see it. Interestingly, there’s a cube mode which displays the photo as a cross, which upon printing out and folding, becomes a cube. To find out more about each site, there’s a description button at the button of each photo.

“ is an independent non-profit organization documenting the UNESCO World Heritage List in panographies - 360-degree imaging. Please read our organization's mission and purpose.

Today 298 sites have been visited : 221 are available on this web site and 77 are currently in post-production and will soon be uploaded. Out of these 298 sites, 216 are World Heritage sites (25% of all 851 registered by UNESCO - 1408 panographies), 15 are on the World Monuments Fund Watch List (71 panographies) and 67 are additions by (162 panographies). Altogether there are 1641 panographies.”

This is one cool site. It’s worth signing up for. WorldHeritageTour brings awareness of the world’s most incredible and beautiful site’s in a vivid and modern fashion. Definitely a must see site.

Will they include alternate ways to allow visitors to donate to the cause? How will they attract more visitors?