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Queen Elizabeth Launches New Site

(AP Images)
On January 20th, President Obama introduced Whitehouse.gov 3.0 (Clinton and Bush had their versions too) and this week UK's Queen Elizabeth is launching a new version of The Official Web Site of the British Monarchy.

I'm not exactly a monarchist but I must admit getting just a little excited about all the pomp and tradition of the royal family. The site, which was first launched in 1997, is the place for all things British royal including pictures of Her Majesty and the rest of the family, art from her various palaces and historical information about the Royals.

New to the site are embedded videos from the official Royal YouTube Channel including one from 1940 that has the sound of young "Princess Elizabeth" speaking on the BBC Children's hour. Other videos cover the coronation of the queen and some show her recent activities.

A section on The Royal Household includes everything you need to know to work at one of the palaces including notices and online applications for of full time positions and summer jobs at Buckingham Palace and other Royal homes. I spied an opening for a trainee butler and didn't notice any requirement that you be a British subject. And in case you wonder how she pays for all these employees, the section on Royal Finances goes into detail about income and expenses including the disclosure that "Head of State expenditure for 2007-08 was £40.0 million ($56,890,000)."

If you find yourself in the UK and want to see one of the Royals, there is a Google map with a mash up that shows past and future royal visits. Maybe Google should send Prince Charles an Android phone with Google's new Latitude service so we can track him in real time.

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