Google spreads tentacles

2005-11-16 12:37

San Jose, California - An ambitious new Google service lets anyone upload almost anything to a publicly searchable database, potentially laying the groundwork for a foray by the internet juggernaut into classified advertising.

The venture, Google Base, could lead to a vast expansion of its content and signal grander ambitions for the king of online search-related advertising.

Google's stated mission is, after all, nothing less than organising the world's information.

Launched as a "beta test" early on Wednesday, Google Base has the potential to make instantly available a vast sea of content including - but not limited to - recipes, job ads, photos, DNA sequences, real estate listings and individual standalone databases.

Normally, it takes web "crawlers" days or weeks to scour the web and feed Google's main search engine with updated information, but they usually can't penetrate content buried in databases.

This tool will make locating anything that's been uploaded nearly instantaneous, provided it finds users willing to provide the content.

Beta test

Submitters will also be able to describe what they uploaded with keywords - making searches and filters easier and more reliable.

What's less clear is exactly what Google plans to do with what it amasses. The company said the primary purpose of Google Base's release, in what's being characterised as a "beta test", is to study and improve how the information is collected and categorised.

Salar Kamangar, vice president of product management at Google, said the company eventually wants to integrate the results with results from its main search engine, its local search site, which identifies results by geographical location, and its shopping comparison service, Froogle.com.

As it stands, Google Base has no mechanism for transacting business, whether buying a car or applying for a job. But its patrons - a job listings service, say - will be able to provide links in whatever they upload to commercial sites.

If Google goes commercial with the new service, which is widely expected, it could pose a formidable threat not only to traditional classified businesses such as newspapers but also online sites like eBay and Craigslist.

Speculation has been further fueled by a patent application for a service called Google Automat that helps would-be sellers generate advertising. The company also is known to be working on an online payment system.

Experiment

And last month, web surfers stumbled on an early version of Google Base that invited people to list things like a used car for sale and a party planning service.

"Honestly I think there is no master plan other than 'Let's put this tool out there and see what people do with it,"' said Danny Sullivan, editor of the industry newsletter Search Engine Watch.

Google Base attempts to get around the problem of spelling variations by suggesting attributes based on what other people have associated with their information in the past, Kamangar said.

"This is really an experiment for us," he said. "We're going to be very open to shifting and changing it depending on how it goes."

A handful of commercial and noncommercial sites have been testing the service for several weeks.

The World Resources Institute has submitted information on a 5 million-record database on sustainable development for 200 countries over a period of up to a century.

Getting in bed with the enemy

"This gives us another way to index our information and hopefully allow our users to find some connections between some issues they haven't seen before," said Amy Cassara, senior associate at the Washington-based institute.

She said sending information to Google is simpler than building the site so that Google's automated crawler captures the information.

CareerBuilder.com also is hoping to make its data - job listings - accessible to more people, said Richard Castellini, CareerBuilder's vice president of consumer marketing.

Other businesses offering classifieds also might find Google Base a helpful way to increase traffic, but that decision could end up haunting them if Google decides to launch tools to complete transactions, said Charlene Li, an analyst at Forrester Research.

"It's like getting in bed with enemy," she said.

- AP