Whenever I look at Google Maps at a global or polar area, the projection hurts. Is there any web service with a zoomable world map, that uses an equal-area projection — preferably pseudorectangular such as the Mollweide projection? Even National Geographics online map uses Mercator.
Another alternative, Google Earth, does not particularly distorts the Earth, but does not give a global view either.
See also: Why has Web Mercator (auxiliary sphere) become the web map standard?
Edit 2018-08-24: Google Maps no longer uses Web Mercator, but has moved to what appears to be an orthographic projection.
Best Answer
Check out this site: earth.nullschool.net when you launch the site, click the 'earth' text, then explore the different projection options... you can pan and zoom on the map too!
Not as detailed, but the implementation of the different projections with the data they're displaying shows a good proof of concept of something you're after I think...