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Microsoft has just released a new app for the iPhone - Photosynth that lets you capture 360° images and then share them with others.

There are several panorama apps available for the iPhone, each with different levels of ease with capturing an expansive view of a particular room. Photosynth stands out as you can capture images not just along a horizontal line, but in all directions - up, down, left and right. And rather than just relying on you to hold the camera steady while you pan, the app gives you guidelines of where the next image should be places and next photo snapped.

Microsoft announced today that it will now give its commerical partners the option to mash up Virtual Earth and Photosynth to create immersive 3D photo experiences. In order to facilitate this, Microsoft also announced the availability of commercial licenses for Photosynth. These commercial licenses remove the restrictions on the number of images a user can use, for example. This could be a great solution for real estate agents, who can easily create an immersive 3D view of a house, retailers who want to give customers a close-up view of a product, or travel businesses that might want to show off a certain destination.

Next Tuesday, the eyes of the United States - and likely the world - will be on Washington, DC, as Barack Obama takes the oath of office to become the 44th President of the United States. Attendance is likely to dwarf any presidential inauguration in history - with estimates currently predicting at least one million people at the event. Regardless of the attendance, one thing is for sure: with nearly ubiquitous access to cameras and video equipment, this will be the most well-documented inauguration, ever. Now, the Microsoft Photosynth team has announced that they will be making the event even more memorable - by creating a three-dimensional "synth" of the inauguration from your photos.