RSSGoogle Adds Advertising to its Maps
By Ed Oswald | Published March 31, 2006, 12:21 PM
Google took the lid off an anticipated new feature for users of its mapping service Friday that would let advertisers promote their businesses directly on Google Maps. The ads would appear as small icons, and would be clickable to reveal logos and pictures of the business in question.
Certain searches would make these advertisements appear. For example, while the service was in testing, Barnes and Noble and Ralph Lauren bought keywords such as "Philadelphia Books" or "Ralph Lauren New York." When people searched using these keywords, the ads appeared.
The Mountain View, Calif., based search giant said it would open the feature up to any advertiser wishing to place their ads on maps covering the U.S., Canada and the U.K.
Payment for the advertising would be similar to Google AdWords in that customers would bid on them. Alongside the graphical representation, a text ad would also appear on the page.
"Both small businesses and large chains can easily target multiple locations within a single Ad Group using the same keyword list - yet another way of targeting more customers more effectively," a Google spokesperson told BetaNews.
In the future, Google may add options to directly contact the advertiser through chat or VoIP, but it has no immediate plans to do so, the company said.
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"anyone making money is evil"
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They tried making everything non-profit in the old Soviet Union, and all they got were long lines to buy toilet paper.
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The Computer Rodent
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|The Giant crap company is getting worse, as several of us have warned everyone that they would. Ads are just to much.
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|Yes, I use to like google untill they just had to try to do everything. Thats when i started to no longer support google.
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|What conspiracist/simplistic/liberal/anti-business thinking by some of y'all(kudos go out to the Fantastic Defenders of Common Sense & 'Just the Facts Ma'am': mrow, PC_Tool, & smith288): that anyone making money(to boot while providing a free service) is evil-- but even worse, anticipatory complaining about supposed/imagined/possible future evils-- not to mention panning without trying...I hope that is not how all you 'un-mentioned, alleged, accused also formed your opinions-preconceived re all practices/matters sexual(ROTFL).
BTW re NASA: just as w/ free services, the funds for corporations & government entities(ergo income/food/shelter/clothing/care/protection/yada for others) do not just materialize out of thin air: The Piper Always Gets Paid(else he wouldn't/couldn't pipe continuously/permanently): it may be truly free only 4 those who live outside NATO!!!!!!!
Kids: feel free to whine-demand oodles of free stuff, then afterwards arm chair quarterback-critique your freebies. And if you don't get exactly what you want, just take to the strees...riot, burn down your country until you get what you want(if anything of value remains, that is)-- you can draw sustenance & moral strength from your brethren's repeated examples all over Europe.
Go on! Fight the Power! Stand for your democratic rights(NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
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|Rules of Satire #1: Be coherent.
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|I just want Crappoogle to go away and to stop eating my bandwidth with their bots all of the damn time. They are a crap company that offers crap. The search is horrid!
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|Just buy some Google stock-- with those earnings you'll be able to budget for fast broadband, or if necessary-- even a move to an area that hast it.
I am curious of what better Google alternative exists......
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|You don't know how to read do you? I was not talking about my ISP, but the bandwidth that he bots use on my site.
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|Don't you have a robots.txt file?
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|He might not know what is that. :P
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|The point is that I shouldn't have too. Google will send 20 bots that will be there 30 minutes where as everyone else, one bot there only 10 minutes. Google does it everyday, everyone else twice a week.
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|Must be why their results are so darn up-to-date.
The bas****s.
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|That is like calling a multi bank robber good.
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|World Wind is put out by NASA and is completely free/open source. http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/ There are alternatives if this ticks me off enough.
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|I doubt it will tick you off. Like the article says, it will only show the ads when you search for a specific type of thing like books or pizza, not when you just type an address or a city. I actually think that could be kind of useful, and Google is a business and ought to make some money off this really top notch service.
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|And here it begins....
Now Google is using ads that are not just text ads.
As the days go on Google becomes less and less of their mantra. "Don't do evil".
Whatever Google.
Google is the devil.
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|Just out of curiosity...how much do you pay to use Google's many services?
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|I don't use Google's services.
If I did I would be happy to pay to not have ads.
However it seems really stupid to pay to not have ads so I just don't use services that have ads. :)
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|"Now Google is using ads that are not just text ads."
I know you haven't used the service, so I'll fogive the mistake...
They are text ads, located beneath the locale (address) listing to the left of the map.
Hardly noticeable, and only existing on searches for various stores or brands in certain locations.
This is hardly evil. :)
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|how do you think companies make money?
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|Curious... You dont utilize any Google services (i dont believe you but ok...) yet you are confortable in criticizing Googles methods of trying to capitalize on their free services of which, again, you dont use.
Pardon me as I laugh directly at you while pointing....
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|If I wanted to be forced fed ads I would look for them. I hate Google's poor search engine that never finds anything even in quotes and then the maps were the only thing that was even close to usable, but now they are giving you more crap. I hate them and wont use them.
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|lmao....
All Good, solid arguments, sir.
Problem is, my searches turn out just fine. Hell, I could hit "I'm feeling lucky" 90% of the time and avoid the extra work of clicking on that first link.
Well, that's actually not the problem. the problem is that I'm not the only one who feels this way. Matter of fact, I'm only one of the 42-or-so percent of web-surfers who use Google. (the next highest is Yahoo...sitting around 27 or something). Exact numbers were in the last BN google article.
Must all be marketing, eh?
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|Yeah, and stupidity. Why is Bush still in office?
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|Heh.
Ouch.
Good point.
I concede...
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|Why don't they add useful features like mouse wheel zooming?
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|MSN Virtual Earth has mouse wheel zooming :-)
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|Ya, but Virtual Earth really sucks!
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