Reuters: Google Earth is not GIS

location based services

Reuters story, that reads a bit like a press release and offhandedly uses the term "buffer" suggests that Google Earth is not a GIS. This is really subtle and I have to give credit to the folks at Penn or the folks at Reuters who teased this out. Note the term "also" in the third paragraph, suggesting, at least to me, that Google Earth is something "other" than GIS. Frankly, I'm impressed at the suggestion that the two work together but are different.
Geographic Information System (GIS) technology is being used to pinpoint the location of commercial poultry flocks, feed mills and processing plants, said Sherrill Davison, professor of avian medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. The information will be used to help create buffer zones around an infected flock and contain the H5N1 strain when it makes its U.S. appearance. Since the beginning of the year, experts have also been using Google Earth, which combines satellite imagery, maps and the company's search engine to span the globe.