Celebrity watchers rejoice! Today, Microsoft Corp.’s online local search and mapping service, Windows Live Local, launched CelebFavorites (http://www.celebfavorites.com/), a Web site that pinpoints the favorite haunts of eight of the world’s top athletes and entertainers, including Eva Longoria, Anna Kournikova, Jeff Bridges and Alex Rodriguez. Each celebrity has used the site to highlight his or her favorite restaurants, hotels, clubs, shops, museums or places to hang out.
CelebFavorites.com enables people to see exactly where each celebrity hangout is on the Windows Live Local map, get directions to and from each location, click through to the Web site of each business or point of interest, and even mark their own favorite places with “pushpins” and e-mail them to friends and family.
These are the celebrities participating and their respective cities:
— Jeff Bridges — Santa Barbara, Calif.
— Stacy Keibler — Washington, D.C., and Baltimore
— Anna Kournikova — Miami
— Eva Longoria — San Antonio
— Alex Rodriguez — New York
— Matt Leinart — Los Angeles
— Brittany Murphy — Edison, N.J.
— Brad Paisley — Nashville, Tenn.
The CelebFavorites.com Web site will run from May 5 to June 30.
“Windows Live Local combines local search, online maps, directions and local business listings into a seamless, all-in-one experience for people,” said Martin Taylor, corporate vice president of the Online Services Group at Microsoft. “By working with these celebrities to showcase the places they love to go, we hope to show how fun and easy it is to use the service, while helping people discover great new places they can call their own.”
For example, actress Eva Longoria has chosen 15 of her favorite places in San Antonio, including the AT&T Center, where she watches her favorite basketball team play. People can clearly see each venue marked on an aerial map of the city and can easily find information about and directions to each place.
By providing road maps, close-up aerial photography, business listings with telephone numbers, driving directions and traffic reports, Windows Live Local enables people to answer the question, “What’s it like there?”
People can see where the celebrities spend their time by visiting http://www.celebfavorites.com/ or get started on a five-star list of their own by checking out Windows Live Local (http://local.live.com/).
