I wanted to better understand Google’s plans for Google Maps in the United States and globally and put the changes into a larger competitive and social context. In an effort to clarify my thinking about the technology and the implications I contacted Mike Dobson of TeleMapics, mapping industry veteran and all around brilliant guy. I asked and he answered.

Mike Blumenthal: Does the recent Tele Atlas boot from Google Maps US mean that Google has developed or acquired routing algorithms?

Mike Dobson: Google worked with deCarta (under its former name Telcontar) when they were beginning the development of their mapping application. deCarta is known for its excellent drill-down server and highly efficient mapping applications. deCarta/Telcontar was the force behind Google’s early mapping and routing efforts (as well as those of Yahoo—by the way, Telcontar was originally founded by a small group of smart guys who had left ETAK (a company that was an early entrant in creating autonav databases that was acquired by News Corp, sold to Sony. Eventually ETAK merged with GDT (in a curious deal) and the combined entity was acquired by TeleAtlas).

Eventually Google progressed to the point where they no longer needed deCarta’s skills and let the contact lapse. Since then, the team at Google has been providing their own, unique mapping and routing technology and applying it to Navteq and TeleAtlas data for quite some time—so this is not news. However, “legal” routing requires that you are certain about the direction of one-way streets, turn restrictions etc., and that your data base is populated with these “official” restrictions on the movements of cars. Although the online routing application is not as stringent an application as providing enhanced routing capabilities in an in-dash navigation unit (or for ADAS (advanced driver assistance systems), it does mean that Google has been actively building an attribute database of road characteristics that links to its database of streets.

Who enforces the standard for “legal” routing? Or are you saying that it is the standard for more sophisticated devices and is self-enforced?

Whether Google or anyone else want to include this in their terms of use, the public has a reasonable right to assume that the maneuvers that Google provides in their routing directions (or the routing directions that are provided by anyone else) will not require the execution of vehicle maneuvers that are illegal or potentially harmful.

The map database used by Google does not simply represent a connected graph, but a graph attributed with street properties that allow a router to build a path across a graph “knowing” when it can maneuver a vehicle right or left, where to access the off or on ramps and other maneuvers that would be required to allow the driver to maneuver a vehicle across a network using a route that will not cause them to violate laws or damage themselves. I suspect the final arbiter of whether a company has created and provided a database that is inherently flawed will be a court of law

Urban Mapping has been helping/investing in a routing platform (I believe for transit)—is that something Google may be using?

To my knowledge, Google is using Urban Mapping’s neighborhood names database, but not its transit routing platform or transit data. Google has been collecting the same types of transit data of interest to Urban Mapping and would likely not believe it needed these data.

Clearly they have an advanced geo-OCR application that they are using to analyze & interpret their StreetView image data and convert the road signs etc.(they spoke about this briefly in their article)?

That is likely and would appear to be the most efficient manner of converting the Street View data into a useful source of attribution for the streets and roads in their databases. One interesting question about Street View is how good the original imagery is (especially the recent imagery with their new platform) and how superior it is to what we see on the Web. In some areas, if the original, is as bad as it appears online, then Google will be forced to obtain information on streets names and other attributes by using the positional information gathered by the Street View vans to set control points for conflating other databases to their own data.

Obviously, Google has not driven all of the streets in the U.S.(at least to my knowledge), so they may be using data from Census and other sources to collect street and road attributes in rural and other areas they have not yet mapped themselves. (This is a supposition on my part – perhaps they have driven the 4,000,000 miles or road in the US – but I think they have not yet completed this task.)

It is my belief that the major issue for Google will be updating their map/navigation database. I suspect they plan to try to accomplish the majority of this through harnessing the power of UGC.

(If you are interested in Street View, pedestrians, navigation and landmarks, you might be interested in a five-part blog exploring some of the ins-and-outs on Google’s interest in these topics. http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=129 , http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=136 , http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=138 , http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=140 and http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=142 )

They are now getting geospatial data from primarily 5 places to fulfill their expansive geospatial vision.

• Renting what they don’t yet have.
• Streetview
• MapMaker
• “Partnering” with public entities
• Cell data

I would also add to your list: Correction data from users who opt to click the “report a problem” tag on the map.

There is no question that their data gathering effort for map database compilation is expansive, expensive and comprehensive. In the process of creating and maintaining their map database, I am sure that Google will have spent an enormous sum of money creating the quality of the data that meets their strategic objectives. Unfortunately, assembling the data is just the “first drop” in filling up a seemingly bottomless reservoir of data. Once you have collected the geospatial data necessary to meet your objectives, you will certainly know better than anyone else where it needs improvement and while you are fixing your “problem areas”, the rest of your data will age and require recertification—especially if you are using it to route people driving vehicles.

With the new “Report Errors” capability that Google implemented, when do they get errors submitted to them, how exactly does Google verify it? E.g. a road is a dead-end—how goes Google know that person is not lying? Or are they again just implementing algorithms to the submitted correction?

Oh come on, the Great Google Knows All. Wait, maybe that was the Wizard of Oz.

Google has not directly revealed its methodology, but the company certainly relies on algorithmic solutions to map updates where possible. It is clear to me that conflation and data mining across redundant sources are major components of their update process.

Some map features are relatively easy to check. For example a “new” street or a “dead-end” street should be visible on the most current imagery available to Google or possibly in probe data of the area. Obtaining or verifying the street name is more difficult, but can often be discovered in files created by local planning offices, since authorization at some level of government must preclude to building of street. In addition, Street View could be a prime source of confirmation for many map elements. Of course, one of the tenets of crowd sourcing is that the frequency of errors decreases with increased inspection. So, Google might make a wrong change from time to time, but the odds are that someone will correct it. On the other hand, if the data the Google is replacing was considered worse than what they have now, does anyone really loose. Well, that’s what Google is hoping you will think. Time will tell.

In the US they are gathering real time traffic information. Google’s probe data is coming from Google Maps on smartphones but not the iPhone. Android will be huge help there no?

Probe data can be of huge benefit to companies building navigable map databases. TeleAtlas, for example, recently announced that they added 1.25 updates to their database that had been gathered through Map Share and from their fleet of probes.

At present, Google’s footprint in the smartphone market is very small and the benefits it currently derives from these data are limited. Although, Google has indicated that they are using their probe data to generate travel time and traffic information, it is difficult to find out whether or not they are attempting to use probe data from Android phones for updating street geometry or other attribute information.

There are a number of issues involved in the use of probe data that complicate its use, including: the accuracy of probe tracking using cell phone-based GPS, whether the probe data is derived from GPS or A-GPS, the geographic variability in signal scattering (i.e. reflectivity caused by urban canyons, trees, the position of the receiver related to your body, etc,), consumers agreeing to permit the use of the GPS trace of their Smartphone, and the potential “cost” of obtaining the required permission to use the GPS data from the network or device operator.

While confidentiality issues seem under control, I suspect that people will eventually become a little more hesitant about sharing information that tracks their location. Yes, I know that it is collected anonymously, but if that track starts out at the same house each day and returns to the same house each night, doesn’t it suggest where you live? For that reason, at least one of the major PND companies, whose users have agreed to tracking, shaves the first two minutes and the last two minutes off of every path. Does everyone follow this standard? I don’t know, but everyone should be interested in how the DNA of their GPS traces are “neutered” by the companies using them. Further, the four minutes of data thrown away probably contains really useful information about local streets, but so it goes.

Do you think their Maps app circumvents this need for obtaining the required permission to use the GPS data from the network or device operator to some extent? Do you think their recent agreements with Verizon are relevant to this?

Yes, relevant, but small potatoes at the moment. Their map app soliciting updates is of much greater value, but the problem here (as with all UGC) is that the responses they receive are going to be spatially auto correlated with population density.

I suspect that the numbers of map changes contributed by people living in rural areas are a very small portion of the map update info Google receives from UGC. In addition, if you look at road lane miles driven in the US (and in Europe) you will find that high proportion of the mileages driven is on local streets, rural routes (state and county level highways) and rural streets. It is unlikely that UGC (which operates on the idea that more observations smooth out the errors in the reporting) will be able to solve the problems with updating roads throughout the extent of the geographic coverages Google provides.

However, coverage quality is a known problem that Navteq and TeleAtlas now deal with, so Google is just joining the group. It is not well known by most analysts that the vast majority of roads in the world are classified by the vendors as Category 5 – also known as local streets and these data are often hard to update or confirm, especially when they occur in locations distant from urban centers (the classical distance decay function applied to map correction reporting).

If TomTom has made great strides with their probe data then why has the Tele Atlas data been such poor quality in the US for Google?

Your observation is interesting. It is my take (and I may not be correct in this, but I think I am) that TeleAtlas has bad data because they fell for the corporate line conveyed by their acquisition GDT (Geographic Data Technologies) that data mining could solve most map database compilation problems. TeleAtlas never fully committed to field vans and field research in the U.S. and fell far behind Navteq—whose data collection efforts are firmly rooted in data collection in the field – because they have been unable to find anything better.

As noted previously, TA added 1.25 million updates to its database related to probe and MapShare contributed corrections. so their data may be improving.

The interesting questions here are “Can User Generated Content improve the quality of the TeleAtlas database and how long will it take to reach acceptable levels of accuracy?”. Whether UGC can be used to create comprehensive map databases of consistent quality at the required accuracy levels across the desired coverage areas is a challenge for the future and, I think is question mark for both TeleAtlas and Google.

Although Google has assembled a host of cartographic resources, and perhaps more high quality brain power than the rest of the world coined, I doubt that they have enough experience with compilation of spatial databases and the creation of map databases to truly comprehend the hellhole they have gotten themselves into. Of course, old farts like me may just be out of date (but I doubt it).

Those companies that Google rents its data from seemed doomed from my perspective. And the others? (See this analysis from WeoGeo).

Not sure that the others licensing data are doomed. For example, the IP laws in other countries favor government map copyrights—such as the powerful Ordnance Survey in the UK. However, if OpenStreetMap and Google can successfully break their stranglehold, the same may happen throughout the rest of the world.

Tele Atlas even in the hands of TomTom is not that profitable, they are slow to revise data, they lack the scale of Google….are they toast?

I suspect so, but a white knight might be in the shadows. In addition, it is too soon to tell. TeleAtlas was founded on the belief that in-car navigation would be a huge market. Although the uptake rates for in-car systems remain low, it is possible that TomTom, who is trying to enter the in-car market through ventures with Fiat and Renault, may be able to make headway in this market. If so, TeleAtlas could prosper. In addition, TeleAtlas may have a role to play in the market for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems and fuel-efficient vehicles (although Intermap Technologies and Navteq may win that market).

What would a typical candidate that could take over Tele Atlas/Tom-Tom look like?

It could be any of several players who might consider owning a map database company a strategic advantage. For example, although Microsoft is currently allied with Navteq, you may remember that Microsoft sued TomTom over a patent issue earlier this year that was settled very quietly. Perhaps a future option was discussed? Who knows? TomTom is now selling for a fraction of what it paid for TeleAtlas, so the right buyer could acquire two interesting assets for a reasonable price. With a fix here and there and the right management, perhaps TeleAtlas could be competitive.

Navteq is protected by Nokia but Nokia does not seem to have the same vision nor ability to execute in the maps world.

Navteq may have better data than Google due to its expertise in field collection, but is likely slowly losing that lead. They may be able to rebound. Also, Navteq serves markets that are likely unappealing to Google (in-car integrated navigation, fuel efficiency, ADAS, etc.). Finally, Nokia views Google and a competitor and is unlikely to work with them. The same is true of others in the growing anti-Google camp who wants use spatial data need a map data supplier, any company that simply chooses remain independent of Google for strategic reasons.

Microsoft? Still a babe in the geospatial woods. They seem to have a grand vision but a late start.

Microsoft is always a wild card. Look for some interesting announcements from them later in the year or perhaps next in respect to mapping and new technologies. I suspect they will raise the ante in their game with Google.

Would it be worthwhile for MSN/Yahoo to team up with OSM? They have some fantastic data.

Probably better to ask this of Steve Coast, since he is more familiar with the current status of the OSM license and how it might be applied to commercial entities. However, MSN and Yahoo should be looking for sustainable competitive advantages and I am not sure that the quality, coverage and consistency of OSM data would be of benefit to them at this stage. Perhaps CloudMade might be an alternative?

One of the important issues in changing map database suppliers is “Does the potential new supplier have the equivalent coverage at equivalent accuracy level with as comprehensive data attributes as your current supplier?” OSM data is not yet the equivalent of that provided by Navteq or TeleAtlas in terms of accuracy, coverage or comprehensivenes, although it is being improved day by day. At present, I see no compelling reason for either Yahoo or MSN to team with OSM, although they are obviously monitoring the situation. Unfortunately, the proportion of the search market served by either company indicates to me that improved mapping is not going to be the key to attracting more searchers. Finally, Google chose not to use OSM data, presumably because it could not maintain the freedom to use the data as it needed under the OSM license.

Google has been at this a good long while and have built up a lead while no one is looking.

Speakers representing Google at conferences I have attended have always been vocal in their complaint that the map data and the business listings data being supplied to them were inaccurate, erroneous and of unacceptable quality. Google’s expense for data licensed from either Navteq or TeleAtlas was very modest—so modest, that they could not get’s the vendor’s ear by complaining.

So, I think that everyone was looking at Google while they developed their mapping machine, but did not understand the scope of the effort Google was mounting. In addition, many have failed to understand that Google’s mapping efforts and interests in geospatial data are driven by the need to expand the footprint and success of the company’s advertising business.

I consider Google’s MapMaker effort as an indication that the company is globally intentioned at the expense of short-term economic gain. Google, unlike Navteq or Tele Atlas, is focused on developing base data not just for industrialized nations with good road systems, but for every place that has cell phone coverage. Other companies will not be able to procure data the equivalent of Google’s in many countries, because neither TeleAtlas nor Navteq have collected it (as a consequence of their focus on navigation by automobiles). I believe that the MapMaker data is a significant competitive advantage for Google.

Their recent developments in the US indicate that Google can develop the underlying geospatial and routing information from their Streetview road data. Their last push on that was an expansion that was “filmed” last fall and rolled out late last year. Within about 9 months they were able to create a reasonably accurate geospatial representation of the US. No small task. Are they buying the data for all of the back-country roads with a liberal enough license to claim the copyright ownership?

I doubt that they are buying or licensing any substantial amount map data in the United States, other than some parcel data. They are probably relying on Tiger 2010 from the Census which is in the public domain, as well as other public sources of data. In some cases they are relying on data sharing agreements, but in all cases, Google is attempting to preserve its right to use the data in any manner they desire.

It does however seem to indicate that once they have enough Streetview data they can pull off switching the other countries out in less than a year even a country the size of the US. That would put their 5-year deal with Tele Atlas in perspective wouldn’t it?

In countries where the government owned mapping data is freely shared with private companies, as it is in the United States, Google can likely supplement their core map data with the additional information needed to create comprehensive, spatially complete, map databases. However, fee-free government sourced spatial data is generally not available in Europe and some other areas of the world (particularly in former colonies of the British Empire).

Further, in still other countries the street and postal addressing systems are very difficult to map and geocode.

I suspect Google will be slower to roll out map data in Europe, unless they choose to find a way to work with the governments involved. Thanks to Mapmaker, they may be able to make great progress in Third World countries, but address information may be a problem in many of these locales. All in all, expect Google to roll out new maps where the money in advertising is to be found.

If you think about their desire to have every bit of web based location data geo-tagged with KML, could one extrapolate this very same logic above to Google’s plan for POI and business data as well?

I think Google has collected map data for two reasons. First, it meets their corporate mission, which is “To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” Second, having a current, comprehensive and complete map database will benefit local search advertising, which should become an even bigger business for Google when mobile local search takes off.

It is my belief that Google’s current local advertising business suffers from both the low quality of the business listings data they use and the mismatch between business listings addresses as reflected by ability to plot them and provide accurate map location. In other words, Google has been leaving advertising money on the table because they have not been able to deliver potential customers to the stores that these customers are trying to find—which in turn limits the business owners’ appetite to advertise with Google. If Google plans to roll their advertising model out in the rest of the world, they need accurate map data and accurate business listings data, two things that they are trying to develop around the world.

How does the local advertising business suffer from the low quality of the business listings data? My experience is more that folks just don’t understand the bid system and their new flat rate product that they are testing might resolve that education gap.

Not sure we are on the same page. I agree that advertisers may not understand how to be effective when using AdWords to represent their business. Conversely the larger problem, in my view, is that Google does not accurately represent the contact information of many of the local businesses that are returned in a search result (due to some of the problems you mentioned above). Users are frustrated when the locations for which they are searching cannot be found at the locations where they are shown on the map.

I have blogged about this “targeting” problem numerous times (mainly under the topic of geocoding – if interested see my blog http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=101 ) and the quality of results do not seem to be improving. In addition, Google’s business listings are often incomplete and non-comprehensive in a spatial sense. It is my take that users don’t have faith that Google can show them local shopping opportunities with a reliable degree of accuracy. In turn, people are not inclined to click the local ads or consider the whole effort with enough conviction to make the system as productive for Google as it should be. Local is one case where the correct phrase is “Google it?” as opposed to “Google it.”

They have noted that their aggregate data is statistically more accurate than any of their suppliers although not enough so and not necessarily to their satisfaction. The old YP system and to some extent InfoUSA created “false positives” i.e. that they claimed a business was still open but was in fact closed. My observation on this is that Google’s methodology is creating exactly the opposite problem in with “false negatives” (for lack of a better phrase… maybe you have one) where they will have 3 locations for one business all geocoded differently or worse will merge two business entities that are still in business into one mixed up record. Or the absolute worst scenario, they have created new vectors to allow nefarious hijacking of legitimate listings with redirected 800#’s and website.

It’s important to rehash a little history here. When the yellow page industry ruled the world, there were books for cities, regions and neighborhoods across the United States, but there was not one unified source of YP data for the entire country, because there was no need for one (and there was no truly national YP company). Only with the advent of the Internet and the development of online business search capabilities was there a need for an authoritative, comprehensive, seamless, source of business listings for the entire United States. The response to that challenge has been less than satisfying and Google suffers from the limitations of the data collection methods of the companies that provide its business listings.

I think Google will have many problems in this area as they go forward. I suspect that they would have been better served using one supplier and prodding them to improve than using a mix of suppliers and data from their own business listings registry Many instances of the “multiple” business mix-up is caused by Google merging listings from various sources and not knowing how to identify multiple instance of the same business that are described with minor changes in the name or address. The business registry approach they are using could help resolve some of this, but most small business owners don’t have the time to understand or screw with all of the problems they can experience when listing with Google. A central registry is a better idea, but a tough position to win support for from the industry.

In addition to replacing Tele Atlas, Google has also added a “parcel” data layer to Maps that shows property boundaries for many locations in the US. Do you have any speculation as to who is providing the parcel data?

My understanding is that Google is relying on a variety of sources of which some are public (e.g. the city of San Francisco) and others are private. The “purported” license with a commercial firm in the business of supply is being held in confidence by both parties. There are only a few possibilities, but I would prefer not to speculate on this issue.

Can this parcel data be used to improve the accuracy of the road data in some way?

My belief is that Google is interested in parcels, at least at present, as a method of increasing the accuracy of their attempts to match addresses with map locations (geocoding). The concept of “roof-top” geocoding is based on knowing the actual location and shape of a property, which, at least conceptually, provides a better geocoding solution than is possible with most other methods.

Unfortunately, Google is finding out that the solution is not foolproof (although better than the alternatives). For example consider an elongated parcel along the edge of the road. It is likely that you would choose the centroid of the parcel to represent the location of the address, but this could result in a significant error if the house is located off-center. Similarly, consider a very large, irregular parcel surrounded by several streets. The centroid of the parcel might be closer to one street than another, but the house could be located on yet another of the bounding streets.

What are the commercial and social implications of Google having this parcel data on line? Will it be used somehow in their Real Estate Listing plans? Will its general availability (if not accuracy) make this information more usable by the general public?

I think it is too soon to tell where Google will go with parcel data. At present, they (as well as Microsoft) are interested in using parcel data to improve geocoding.

Leaving aside the question of politics (if that is possible), isn’t a mapping effort like Google has undertaken be better served by a monopoly? Doesn’t the cost, efficiencies of scale, the ability to leverage people and a single technology lend itself to a single solution rather than multiple solutions? Does the need for on-going updates and the cost of those indicate that a shared effort might be more productive than a competitive one? Should this information and the maintenance of it be put in trust or handled by a single entity for the use by all?

Wow, this topic provides the horns of a dilemma for a conspiracy theorist. Is a monopoly ever better than competition and for whom? But supposing this happened, who would control access to the data? And who would regulate the supplier. Oh, wait, it would probably have to be a government or quasi-government agency (e.g. the United Nations, ISO, etc,) and then all of these problems would go away. Right – and so would accurate, timely and up-to-date data. By the way, one of the reasons the approvals for the acquisitions of TeleAtlas and Navteq were held up a little longer than expected was that the EU was concerned about the reduction in competition that might result from these deals (did you know that Google formally complained to the U.S. government about Nokia’s proposed acquisition of Navteq?).

I guess I am just too oriented towards free markets to think a monopoly would be of advantage in market for map data. Google has taken the lead in map databases because they industriously endeavored to create a database that meets their unique needs. Yes, their financial strength is the reason that they were able to fund this effort and their technology was the reason they were able to enter quickly and trump others. However, there is nothing in their behavior that precludes others from doing the same.

Another view of the monopoly market might be found in studying the Ordnance Survey of the UK. You can license really great data at an enormous expense and under restrictive licensing terms. OpenStreetMap is one response to this “quasi-monopoly” and purpose-built street maps of London by Bartholomew, Lovell Johns and others reflect the notion that monopolies are not always beneficial.

Does Google perceive the collection and generation of geospatial information a key competitive differentiator or a necessary evil?

Another dilemma! I suspect that Google began their map compilation efforts as a necessary evil to remedy their dissatisfaction with the maps being provided to them by Navteq and TeleAtlas. Google passed on the opportunity to acquire both Navteq and TeleAtlas because they believed that they could produce something better. Once they started development, mapping really got in to their corporate culture and they began to realize that map compilation, presentation and distribution was a key competency within the grasp of their organization. It was only a few steps higher on the ladder before they realized that Google could be a market leader in map data quality and coverage.

The bottom line? “All information is meant to be free”… free for Google but once in always in, leveraged by all of the other data and technology to create a scale and functionality that can not be matched. They essentially own the foundational data and data points for the whole next generation of user experience.

I have often heard that the happiest day in a boat owner’s life is the day he buys his boat, while the second happiest is the day he sells his boat. Now that Google “owns” a big slug of geospatial data, they may learn the meaning of “buyers remorse,” since they will have to maintain and update the data based on the standards required by their advertising business.

Updating geospatial data is a pain. Google may believe that is has a “better idea” for doing this (I presume UGC is a core value), but doubt that Google yet understands the ongoing complexity of this challenge. Relying on UGC here, may be very unsatisfying. Google may know that it needs better data from its users in East Nogadoches, Texas. Now if the users contributing data in East Nogadoches, Texas only knew about this need and had time to do something about it in the next month or two. Of course, these types of concerns go away if you have enough probes, but will they? When?

As to your comment on Google and the user experience, I agree that they are hard to beat. But it is more than just their technology, it is their outlook and willingness to share its successes with its community. For example, any of us can obtain a free license to use the Google Map API. In addition, we can use AdSense to publish Google maps with Google AdSense ads at no cost from Google and make money in the process. Recently Google added the powerful GoogleBar to maps (see my blog on the topic—http://blog.telemapics.com/?p=178 ) allowing the users to search the maps for items of interest, such as kilts in Edinburgh, chocolates in Brussels or anything anywhere. The advantages that Google holds are not just from its technology, but are based on its awareness that putting technology in the hands of its users will result in successes that even Google had not imagined.

I would like to thank Bill Slawski, Ahmed Farooq, Barry Hunter & Gary Price for help in understanding some of the background material, finding resources and figuring out the right questions to ask. I also want to thank Mike Dobson, President of TeleMapics, for his incredibly generous sharing of time and information that so helped me understand the digital mapping world that is affecting us all.

Google, in pushing the not-yet-finished Maps product to the forefront of search, has created an environment where businesses that would gladly trade their grandmothers for a powerful marketing strategy seemingly romp at will.

PureShear, the locksmith turned Maps black hat & black hat whistle blower, is a product of this weird interaction of the laissez faire & easily accessible marketing power of Google Maps and the hyper-competitive Locksmith industry. He recognized the problem and his tenuous position on the slippery slope of methods that violated Google's guidelines. PureShear attempted to rectify it as best as he understood and subsequently revealed the details of the illicit methods to Google.

He, much more so than Google, put his profession on the line and is paying an appropriate price. He and his listings have been banned from Google Maps. However, it is not clear that Google has dramatically changed its product nor that locksmiths practicing more egregious tactics are being equally punished.

The whistle blower never has it easy in our society. We all recognize their hypocrisy and self interest and they are often shunned by peer and corporation alike. But his wrongdoing and culpability is really much less than that of Google.

Google, in highlighting the Local 10 Pack in universal search results (ten local listings typically appearing next to a small map at the top of search results) proclaimed that the rough-cut Maps and its companion Local Business Center was ready for prime time. Their “release quickly and iterate” thinking put a product in the market place that has not been able to withstand the assaults from black hats.

The strategy, which worked so well in general search, has put real businesses on the firing line. It is not Google who has suffered as a result of this strategy. It has been the small florist, the honest locksmith and the unaware Microsoft.

Despite repeated attempts by the search industry to communicate the need for more controls and oversight, Google has continued to release features into local that are open to abuse. Google has used its release early and iterate tactic to gain market share at the expense of more circumspect competitors and on the fragile incomes of small businesses.

Local search is about accuracy and truth—not relevance, at least as that word is defined in the world of web search. The goal should be to accurately display the who, what, when and where of commerce in the non-virtual world. The practices that Google developed for search relevance worked well when taming the world wide web. Now that the need is to accurately catalog and communicate about the functions and locations of entities in the real world, these policies and practices need to be rexamined and revised to fit the new reality.

Google has offered small business the opportunity to be found via Local. Google is at the forefront of making small and medium businesses aware of the opportunities and benefits of marketing via the internet. This opportunity is a golden one as the internet moves into our lives in the new, meaningful way that is local search. The moment should not be lost. Google should assume the responsibility that comes with their leadership. They should not be guilty of carelessly turning local into the snake oil sales channel of the new millennium.

Google’s response

Google was given this article prior to publication and asked for their comments. Carter Maslan, the Director of Product Management for Google’s Local Search effort had this to say:

“Our goal is to perfect search quality, and business listing accuracy is an absolutely critical element of that goal. This is an ongoing effort and we’re continually working to improve and enhance our listings and what we offer local business owners. Abuses are bad for users, bad for Google and bad for the affected business; we take them seriously and want to tackle the problem in a way that scales to millions of businesses globally. From our experience to-date, we believe that remaining open to the local expertise of business owners and users produces search results that do a far better job of reflecting ‘ground truth.’ And we’re not judging success simply on the net gain in search quality; we’re also working to equip individual businesses with the tools required to ensure that their individual listings are accurate and in their control.”

“In addition to the corrections from business owners, the vast majority of end user edits are done appropriately — you can see some great examples of the improved accuracy resulting from high-quality edits here, here, and here. For example, that newly opened restaurant really wants to be found this weekend – both by the owner and by users – and either the restaurateur or a customer can put it on the map instantly. We want to protect that majority-case benefit while going after minority-case spammers.”

Can you share the highlights of your future road map?

Mark: During the last 6 months, Mapquest has come out of hibernation and is now firing on more cylinders and delivering more products. There were two things going on prior to that time period that explain our low profile. There was considerable effort working on our new back-end technology. It is based on completely new platform technologies that was consuming a fair bit our effort. There was also a bit of miscalculation in that we didn’t do much that was visible to the user. In hindsight we should have been more visible but we knew we needed to get our house in order to do what we wanted to do. This is exemplified by the deliveries in the last 4 months. Every 2 weeks for the last four months we have delivered new functionality and features. We have 46 million users that have been with us for many years. Looking at customer support emails many were happy with what they saw… despite what market pundits noted. More often users complain about changes. We needed to be conscious of not changing too much too quickly. We are attempting to migrate users in an orderly fashion to the new interface so that the people who depend on Mapquest are not abandoned. We need to be sure user base will accept changes in our new product.

Happily the things that we released, like Local.Mapquest.com (which is somewhat radical for our user base) and other the new things, are being accepted by our users… we are trending 3 million uniques a month on our new local product. Our audience is embracing these changes. For the future we are obviously doing more development in the local space and search space of “where is it, how to get there and what’s nearby” across dot-com and mobile and moving toward personalization of that experience. Currently, in “where is it and how to get there?” we are the leaders in the space. We are investing quite heavily in dot-com in the “what’s nearby” component. In the last four months we also emerged in the mobile space. We have now released the new Mapquest 4 Mobile. It is available on 4 handsets and now have released on 5 new products. It emphasizes “what’s near by”.

I noticed that your recently introduced iPhone product has a very clean and minimalist interface compared to your dot-com site.

Mark: Our iPhone product has exploded in terms of use. The iPhone has no history so it can be very clean. The interface on Mapquest.com is evolving but there is a great deal of user resistance to change on dot-com. But there are and will be lots of changes on mapquest.com. Every month we run reports against every link and create heatmaps… and we will decommission and introduce new things over time. The challenge is our loyal legacy audience so we have to migrate slowly.

Christian: We are the only mapping site monetizing our audience. For our competitors monetization is not a key element. For us, it has been since the early days of being acquired [by AOL in 2000]. In the past, this monetization was very coarse-grained and not very targeted. We are focusing our energies on bringing relevant advertising to users. They may not need as much advertising going forward with smart optimization. We run a healthy a business with advertising, licensing and subscription revenues. In mobile, for example, we offer turn by turn as a subscription service.

Mark: When you see all the ad placements and you look at the click-thrus, the users are finding those sponsored search listings valuable. Because we are profitable, we only have sponsored links that users want and use. In monetizing the site, the ads have been carefully targeted and people are actively clicking on those results and finding them valuable. Monetization has been a dirty word but monetization goes hand-in-hand with our user experience.

You have been a market leader in directions for many years. Hitwise data show a rapid rise of Google as a competitor. Many have already declared the battle as lost by Mapquest. How would you respond?

Mark: We see Google Maps in many ways as an endpoint of a search query and because of that, their growth is inherent to their business. The people that come to MapQuest are here for the explicit purpose of finding “where is it, how do I get there and what’s nearby.” Google Maps may be gaining ground in terms of unique visitors but our user engagement and value proposition is very different than Google Maps. Visitors to MapQuest are far more engaged as we are actually a destination website. Consumers actively look and search for MapQuest. In fact, MapQuest is the 8th most searched term, according to Hitwise. Google Maps is 57th. MapQuest also has a deeper level of user engagement as demonstrated by 113% more pages viewed per visitor per month than Google Maps and visitors spending 78% more minutes (13.8 compared to 7.8 minutes) on MapQuest versus Google Maps. One of MapQuest’s key values is the trust and confidence our users have in us to provide reliable accurate directions and an engaging and easy-to-use experience.

Google competes and builds technology in an amazing number of markets. Even in just the local/mobile space, they offer SMS, mobile maps, Google Earth, MapMaker, MyMaps and so on. How do you decide where to compete and put your resources?

Mark: MapQuest is in the middle of a transformation from a mapping utility to being a location-centric local user experience and destination. In fulfilling our mission of “where is it, how do I get there, and what’s nearby,” we continue to invest in our web sites, API’s and mobile products and services that extend and deepen these experiences. In recognition and in support of our consumers being on-the-go we continue to invest in deepening the connection and integration of MapQuest online with the mobile MapQuest products. Whether it’s via our wireless website, our free MapQuest4Mobile application or MapQuest Navigator (our voice-guided navigation application), we realize that mobile is a key part of future growth. In addition we offer the “send to” options of send to cell, car and GPS devices which extends the overall MapQuest experience to the device of choice for the consumer. Our goal is to deliver a more location-oriented solution that provides information before users start, along their way and at the end of your journey.

Christian: We are concerned about competing over the long haul with Google because of their ability to create new behaviors. We know that we have to evolve business to become a destination by adding more depth and value. One of the key habitualizing effects is that now that users can get maps from mobile phones and start using that, they are going to tend to go back to that same product on the web. Mapquest is trying to create loyal user habituation through a personalized profile down through the cellphone. The heart and soul of Mapquest is the experience in the routing. We can never loose sight of that core capacity. If we can maintain brand trust in the user, we feel that we have a respectable position. Mapquest maintains its pure play position. From that perspective we have strengths to capitalize on the long term. We need to cater to users in a way that creates an extension of the experience into other devices. For example, we have a relationship with OnStar that creates value via Mapquest.com sending data to OnStar.

Mark: We are not thinking that we will loose all of our users to Google tomorrow. We are not going to turn Mapquest into search.com. It is interesting how the maps space has evolved we think that our biggest competitor is Yahoo given what they have evolved into. Yahoo is much closer to Mapquest in terms of page consumption versus the shallower user visits in Google.

Where and how do you see the deeper, more granular hyper-local information developing? Hasn’t the low hanging fruit of that information (movie times, used cars etc) already been plucked?

Mark: Local is more than business listings. With the proliferation of niche local sites there is no single place that gives you the value of the experience of those sites. Thus was born Mapquest Local to enable people that once they have defined where they want to go they can see the other information they are interested in. Basically Mapquest Local is the Sunday news plus some unique internet content… and [we] let the users customize it to their own needs. Twelve months ago we couldn’t have done Mapquest Local. Now we are able to bring in third party and AOL content and enable users to take advantage of all content. Like via Yelp… why not enable users to get access to the verticals? No one vertical expresses the total experience. Mapquest has no editorial control; we link to content and allow the downstream property to present what they want to present and send the traffic down to that site. We are the 11th largest site on the internet, the largest local front door to the internet. We want to make all local content to be accessible via Mapquest via feeds. We will not limit by geography or partner but will allow everybody to come and play. We have done an open developer call for local content feeds that are topical. We will facilitate connections to feeds and expose them to our many users. There is no quid pro quo. And we provide feedback to feed providers as to how popular it is. They will ciliate content to Mapquest and send traffic back. Yelp was first to call and within 2 weeks they were live.

Please provide some background and history for Mapquest.

Mark: MapQuest was originally founded in the 1960s by R.R. Donnelley & Sons in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, as a cartographic services division responsible for creating free road maps given to gas station customers. By the 1970s, MapQuest became a leading supplier of custom maps to reference, travel, textbook and directory publishers. Donnelley began making maps with computers in the mid-1980s. Much of that code was adapted for use on the internet to create the MapQuest web service in 1996. In February 1996, MapQuest launched the first consumer-focused interactive mapping site on the Web, MapQuest.com. MapQuest was acquired in 2000 by America Online, Inc. Company headquarters are in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and Denver, Colorado. With an innovative business model and first-of-its-kind web site, MapQuest.com captured the attention of the internet consumer and the business market. Today, the culmination of a 40-year evolution of mapping and technology has made MapQuest a leading consumer web site and business application for getting people where they need to go.

I have seen you mentioned in several places offering actual customer service with a human face. What role do you see customer service playing in your local offerings?

Mark: At MapQuest we have always had a human customer support team for both our enterprise and consumer products. We believe that the ability of our users to connect and communicate directly with MapQuest and know that their comments, suggestions and concerns are taken seriously is a key differentiator for us in the marketplace. Our customer service also goes beyond answering submissions to our help forms. We’re out there as part of the internet community, engaging and talking to people, listening and responding. The customer service role for local specifically is focused in two parts. First we are helping to coordinate those who wish to participate in our MapQuest Local product by providing direct feedback and direction on how best to organize and provide their content to MapQuest and the MapQuest users. The second focus is to mange the feedback coming from users, much like viewers calling tip lines for news affiliates. People local to an area are the ones capable of providing the most accurate and up-to-date information. They know where they live better than we ever will and we both need to work together to make sure that the people going to where they live next to have the best information and experience possible. From our users we gather incredibly useful feedback regarding both usability and also the underlying content which we are able to pass on to the underlying providers, thereby improving their service too.

How do you rank businesses in local listings?

Mark: Business rankings on local depend on the metrics and criteria of the content providers. For City’s Best, users vote on their favorite locations in various categories. For a partner like Yelp, ratings are based on user recommendations and the number of votes.

What is your view of Mapspam?

Mark: There will always be people trying to game a system. As user generated content becomes more widely available and useful, finding ways to verify the accuracy and assign reliable reputation metrics will be an evolving process. The challenge for MapQuest is that 44 million people depend on us to be the most accurate and reliable service in the marketplace, so as we add more kinds of content, we’re looking at tools to manage the accuracy and reliability of it. Look at it this way, if username “jb12345″ told you to take a “short cut” along your route, how much faith would you have in it? What if a friend recommended it? What about MapQuest? We’re looking at responsible ways to use the wisdom of the local crowds to improve information users get on MapQuest. Using metrics like the recommendations of locals, people in online social circles, and feedback of a user’s previous recommendations are some of the ways to gauge the reliability of the data.

Speaking of user generated content, what is your position on that?

Mark: User generated content can take many forms, from feedback on the accuracy of an address to new content on a location such as ratings and reviews, photos, etc. Empowering users to help more directly to improve, supply and experience location relevant content on MapQuest is a goal for us. Users have been actively helping us with data corrections for some time, but we’d like to see it be more direct and visible. We will be expanding the role of the user in generating and providing content in the near future. Our challenge however continues to be how exactly we will ensure the quality and reliability of the information. Again a core MapQuest tenet is accuracy and reliability and since our users depend on MapQuest we have an obligation to ensure that all content is dependable.

How are you getting your basic business listings?

Mark: We source basic business listings from third party providers who make it their business to verify the data and provide frequent updates. We then augment that data with some of our own information.

Where do you see local search going over the next 6 months in terms of technology and market share? Over the next 2 years?

Mark: Local will continue to be a fast growing segment. As browsers and mobile services continue to improve, so will people wanting to know “what’s around me” on demand. Our goal is to use technology to blend a socialized, personalized, and localized experience. Experientially speaking, local has so far been rather generic, identifying users within broad spaces of geographic boundaries. I would expect to see this becoming more and more granular, focused to the “hyperlocal” level, while simultaneously re-aggregating into non-standard delineations—for example, neighborhoods instead of zip codes, which can overlap, and are defined on a social level by those who live there.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

The obvious answer is that they are all local searches on popular phrases in major metro areas. A less obvious answer is that like the infamous Denver Florist search last December, they all return seemingly authoritative OneBox results on popular geo phrase searches in a major market, as in the example below:

The searches demonstrate clear problems with Google’s Universal Local OneBox algorithm. Certainly, “major city + service/product” searches should return a broad range of consumer choices and not an authoritative OneBox that limits the view to one highlighted provider of the service. Google returns the OneBox result because the ostensible business name in the result supposedly mirrors the search phrase and in Google’s opinion provides strong relevance in relation to the user query.

The problem with the above result is that the business shown on the map is the Marriott Orlando Downtown, not “travel.ian.com.” The Marriott’s business listing has apparently been hijacked.

In fact, all of the listings returned on these searches have apparently been “hijacked” via Google’s community edit feature and the business name of the listing has been modified from the original, Marriott Orlando Downtown, to match the search phrase. The URL’s of the listings have also been modified to direct users to an affiliate link on an appropriate site. How? Through the use of Google’s community edit feature for local business listings.

Google’s community edit feature has become the playground of black hat affiliate marketers and is sorely in need of more security. Of interest in this regards is that many of these listings are for multinational corporations. These are not small independent business that are too busy to notice. They are well funded, well oiled marketing machines. Yet none apparently realized they needed to claim their business record in Google’s LBC.

But the most intriguing commonality of the three searches? They were all changed by the same “community editor” that was responsible for the Florist Hijackings reported almost a month ago. Despite the many reports of these hijackings, where income was diverted from the florist in an allegedly illegal scheme, Google has apparently not yet put a stop to the work of one of the obvious perpetrators.

At SMX East, Greg Sterling asked Google’s Eric Stein the following question:

Q: :: What would you say to the many florists whose listings were hijacked in mid September by affiliate mapspamers?

Google: We won’t always be ahead of the spammers – that’s a tough race to run. But we will be increasingly effective at putting an end to situations like the one you mentioned as soon as they pop up. And we don’t just blacklist the bad guys – we put systems in place to block the next guy who tries to do what the last guy did, so we’re making it increasingly hard for spammers to hurt the legitimate business owners.

While Google may be feverishly writing code to fix the problem in the future, they also have an obligation to go back and clean up the index, ban these prolific “community editors” and, at least until a better solution can be found, put in some restrictions on community edits. Perhaps they need to redefine the word “soon” was well, as some florists listings have not yet been cleaned up.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

If you’re a small business with a local listing in one of the major search engines, you need to beware: the same scenario described above could happen to your local search result info if you’re not careful. The apparent hijacking of a large number of independent florists in Google Maps several weeks back is just such a story. Google, in the role of Post Office, allowed someone to hijack listings in the Florist industry using the community edit feature.

For those of you unfamiliar with the incident here is a brief recap. The technique, apparently in widespread use in the locksmith, pay day loan and other industries, exploited weaknesses in Google’s Community Edit capability. In this newly reported case in the floral industry, affiliate mapspamers targeted high ranking florists in major markets that had not claimed their business listings in the Local Business Center so as to be able to benefit from an existing businessâ ranking and reviews.

The spammers, using these community edit tools, would change the phone number to another local number, change the location of the business slightly and then proceed to add a category, a new URL and ultimately the change name of the business. Apparently the small move in location convinced Google’s system that all subsequent changes were legitimate. The listing would retain the ranking and reviews of the original business but redirect to a Canadian florist fulfillment house via the affiliate’s website. The listings displayed prominently in the Local 10 Pack on searches for florist in major markets across the U.S.

Here are some screen captures (from Real Florist) that illustrate the sequence of events.

Clearly every small business needs to claim their listing in Google’s Local Business Center to be sure that the information that is presented to the public is accurate. But as we have seen, not every small business is aware that they need to do so and even if they are, there is anecdotal evidence that they still can’t figure out how to do so. Clearly more has to be done and responsibility for making sure that local business data is secure falls directly onto Google.

There have been a number of suggestions for Google on procedures and practices in vetting user generated content. Certainly those or something similar needed to be implemented.

More importantly, Google needs to put the full weight of their commitment behind local. From the top down, Google needs to commit the resources and integrity to local search that it deserves. We know that Google’s role in local has been critical in moving local marketing front and center with Universal search. Their efforts at providing deep local information via Google Earth and their Google Vote are impressive.

But as Google’s dominance of search transfers to local, there is an attendant rise in their responsibility. They need to play in the local space like these businesses were their neighbors not just a pieces of data. The standard for success in local needs to move from relevance to truthfulness and when there is a mistake there needs to be openness and speed in correcting it.

We are in the early days of local search and just getting a glimpse of its incredible power to influence. If we are to ever hope that it will be more than the snake oil salesman of the new millennium than now is the time for Google to step and guarantee that there is integrity and accuracy in the results.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

Mike Blumenthal: What was the goal of the upgrade? What prompted the change?

Carter Maslan: We wanted to address usability issues to make it simpler to get through the process and having it flow on a single screen was a big driver.

Usability was the main motivator… simple things like not a big enough map to be able to accurately move the pin, having a clear sense of where you are in the process, etc. We were trying to address the flow through the enrollment to make it as fast and simple as possible.

What do you perceive to be the greatest improvements from the new interface?

We do a combo of usability studies in labs and monitor actual usage and user success rates. We look at both and try to improve the overall process. This was the first refresh of the UI in a while and was intended to pick up high payback UI changes.

There were a lot of complaints in the Maps groups over the past 10 days. What was up?

All things will be fixed very very soon and those things not yet fixed should be OK within days. We were not able to replicate the bulk upload problem. But all problems [with the new Local Business Center] should be reported into the Maps Group and we will take a look.

The Maps team read the posts about problems on the local blogs and in the groups but their heads were down. The team fixing the problems were totally heads down… so no one was available to give answers in the group.

The main point is that even if we need to work on proactive communication, the team is paying attention, and will try to do better on the communication.

Was there a change in listing policy? The Pin is now required on all single entries? What precipitated that change?

We are experimenting with how much verification vs. how much ease of use. There are variables as to when to prompt… In the past it had been too liberal, and is becoming more stringent. We are experimenting on the quality of the listings and spam. There is no hard yes or no answer to the correct structure.

Will there be some accommodations to facilitate entry for agencies and such? Will there be something like a Trusted Partner status?

We are contemplating something like the letter of agency policy for cell phone companies… we are fleshing out the details. We are interested in coming up with a way to allow people with good intentions to do so, for both bulk uploads and multiple singles entries.

We initially are looking at it primarily geared toward primary sources—like a chain. How do we make it easier for the chain to control the records even if there is conflicting info from a secondary data source?

The first step is for to us to provide simplified verification for use by primary data providers like a national business or chains. Whether it extends to other aggregators or agencies is in discussion.

We hope to have this available soon… less than a year and maybe as soon as a quarter. We are working through the process.

Are there short term efforts to integrate analytics and AdWords?

I am not on the AdWords team. We do have joint discussions on how to make everything simpler. The auction concept is difficult and there are discussions on how to simplify and to maximize an ad campaign. But for now we will stay dedicated to getting basic listings up and running.

Is there a plan to roll out the new Local Business Center interface to the international market? What is the time frame?

We want to work through the kinks in U.S. first and then do localization, but it will go as soon as things are ironed out… less than a quarter.

What percentage of total listings in Maps have been controlled by the businesses or their proxies in the Local Business Center?

No real numbers to publish… individual businesses [with entries in the Local Business Center] are in low seven figures and are growing well.

Coupons seem to be the poor step-child and they don’t get broad exposure. What are the plans for coupons?

We are talking about options to increase discoverability. One of the things being discussed, for example, would be coupons as another attribute and being able to filter on them like by neighborhood or rating.

Was there a significant increase in Maps traffic due to the increased links in the Local 10 Pack?

Part of the increase is growing awareness that users can find more local business information… awareness was a boost in and of itself. It did increase traffic.

Now that you have seen the pattern of many types of spam, is there an effort to clean out old spam in Maps?

We didn’t want to overbuild before the problem was significant, but will go back and purge bad data.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

I’ve seen several pleas for help in fixing incorrect listings in the Google Maps for Business Group. It’s a straightforward (though sometimes time-consuming) process to fix these incorrect listings, such as this one from Steppingstone Theatre in St. Paul, Minnesota:

This is a problem that many posters to Google Maps for Business Group have reported about. Some of these requests seemed to have been handled quickly by Google staff, while some have been outstanding for many, many months.

The way I see it is that you have five steps to follow to have the old address showing in the PlusBox fixed or removed in Google Search:

Step 1: Remove all references to the old address from your website.It appears that 4 pages on the Steppingstone Theatre site contain the old address: site:steppingstonetheatre.org 75

I see that every page of your site has your new address on it in a form that Google can understand. That’s good, but that and your change to your record in the Local Business Center is not quite enough for Google to “get it”.

Step 2: Update/check your record at InfoUSA & Axciom, the primary business data suppliers to Google. The easiest way to do this is at this great page by Frank Fuchs with links to all of these sites (and the yellow page sites as well): How To Get Your Business Listed on Local Search Engines.

Step 3: Contact all of the other websites that still list your old address and ask them to make the change. It appears that there are many (399?). See the search: “steppingstone theatre” “5th St”.

Focus on the larger national review and Yellow Page sites that show your address in the above results, such as:

• Yahoo Local

• Yelp
• MerchantCircle
• InsiderPages
• Yellowbot
• Cityguide
• Outside.in
• 10Best
• Dex

If you want to be particularly thorough in this effort, you may also want to search on “Fifth St,” which finds another 50 or so web references that have your old address.

Step 4: Wait 6 to 8 weeks to see if this has had an impact.

Step 5: Repeat the above steps. In programming terms, this is referred to as an endless loop.

If all else fails, you can always hope that Google Maps Guide Jen takes pity on you and fixes the erroneous address in the Plus Box.

The good news is that you have obviously been successful and active in promoting your theater online in that Google seems to show almost 450 web site pages with your old address. The bad news is that the old information will dog you for years to come, unless you take a proactive role in changing the now erroneous information that is on the web. When it comes to finding new information on the web, Google is fast and efficient. However, it’s not so good at recognizing things like changes in address.

Google could provide better tools to fix this problem, or a more responsive reporting system. Unfortunately, they do not at this time offer any real solution to addressing this issue. They have not informed anyone where the erroneous data comes from, so all of the above suggestions are just educated guesses.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

There’s a new species of mapspam that’s particularly obnoxious: affiliate mapspam, first reported at the eClick Performance Blog. With the search engines’ new open policies allowing even non-owners of businesses to edit local business listings, unscrupulous affiliates take advantage of a loophole by editing unclaimed hotel records, changing the URL so that it first points to an affiliate tracking link, and then ultimately redirecting the searcher to the hotel’s official website. This tactic earns the affiliate a referral fee for any reservations made. The affiliate interjects themselves, invisibly to the searcher, between the end user and the hotel, for the sole purpose of collecting an essentially unearned profit.

From the eClick blog post:

Primarily involving large hotel chains, you can see the ease with which an affiliate can replace direct links in Yahoo with an affiliate link in order to benefit from a hotel’s local listing. In the example below you’ll notice that a search on Yahoo Local for “Marriott hotel” that the official site for Marriott New York Financial Center shows as tkqlhce.com.

This link will eventually lead users to the appropriate page on Marriott’s Web site, but not before first being directed through a Commission Junction tracking page.

As noted in the blog entry Yahoo compounds the problem in their Local listing by further masking the record.

The question that eClick raised, So, how many instances of affiliate spam are there on Yahoo Local?, motivated me to do a little research. Just how many times has this particular affiliate pulled this trick?

I presented the query (city + hotel) to Yahoo across 6 major markets: New York City, LA, Chicago, Philadelphia, Houston, and Phoenix. The query returned 8455 hotel listings in those markets. Of those listings, 46 had fallen prey to this form of Mapspam by the same affiliate. Interestingly, these affiliate links redirect to two other websites prior to landing on the hotel’s reservation site. For example, the link entered in Yahoo:

Yahoo Link for the Marriott Airport in Phoenix

redirects to long URLs at www.apmebf.com and then www.emjcd.com prior to landing on the Marriott Fairfield Airport Inn in Phoenix. Here is a link to an excel spreadsheet of the 46 deceptive links in Yahoo: hotels.xls

There is a cautionary tale for Yahoo, Google, or any company that allows user generated content in their local product. These affiliate spammers are deceptively providing a “service” that is unneeded and unwanted. Whatever they are making is too much. Milton Friedman may view this as the “efficiency of the market,” but I view it as theft. The victim is the Marriott and ultimately the consumer. Previous types of mapspam seemed to skirt the edges of the law. Affiliate mapspam seems to break the law.

Additionally, this type of affiliate spam raises a number of ethical, legal, and technical questions for Yahoo and any service that allows this type of trade.

• What mechanisms do the search engines have in place to protect these hotels?

• How much has it cost the hotels to date?
• Should the search engines have more readily available reporting mechanisms?
• Who really is at fault, and has a crime been committed? If so, what crime and in what jurisdiction?
• Are the search engines complicit in any potential crime?
• Should there be government regulation of online business listings to address this sort of practice?

We are in a new age where new rules need to be developed. I do not know the answers, but there is a certain urgency to solving these problems. The benefit of the knowledge of the masses may be quickly overshadowed and buried by the activities of the few if something isn’t done about this pernicious form of mapspam—and quickly.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

Recently I had a phone conversation about Google Maps categorization issues with Carter Maslan, one of Google’s geo product directors. Carter leads the product management efforts for Local Search. Prior to joining Google, Carter was Director of Technical Evangelism at Microsoft and Director of Product Management and Marketing at Inktomi. The talk was informative and hopefully the first of several that will provide greater insight to the Maps product and its workings. Below, an account of our conversation and what I learned from Google about their efforts to fix the problem.

Carter noted that he and Google were painfully aware of the categorization issues that had been noted on my blog and in the Google Maps for Business Group and that he shared the small business user’s dissatisfaction, and he assured me that they have been working on the fixes. He commented that he was personally frustrated that it has been over a year during which they had not been able to address these core problems.

According to Carter, the reason for the delay was that the category issue has not been as high on the to-be-solved list as other problems. He said that Google’s focus is on end user experience and that while this problem has affected business people and it was serious, it has not yet had that large of an affect on the end user experience.

There are apparently a number of things in the short term (2 to 4 weeks) that will be changed and there will be greater changes going forward. I asked if they will be increasing from the current 520 categories in the Local Business Center that businesses have to choose from and the answer was an unequivocal yes.

He noted that Google’s general idea about categorization was to not pick a single taxonomy, provider, or structure, and that their goal was to increase confidence by using many data source signals. Their general approach was to create an overarching categorization system that is a natural reflection of the way people think about these types of searches.

The categorization system is meant to support the variety in user expectation due to topic and geography and will improve over time through usage. He offered up the example of the different intent of the search “Chinese Restaurant” when searched for in NYC and Beijing and the need to develop categorization technology that could take that difference into account.

They have been using different providers of the same data and the categories in use came from one of many providers and web sites. Their end goal is for it to be very open and for there to be a competition between sources to provide the most probable categorization of any given business.

Going forward, Carter noted that “spamming” of the categories was an issue that they were dealing that was compromising quality. The example he noted was of the limo services indicating in the LBC that they were actually an airport so their site should appear for airport searches. He felt that over the long haul the best solution was to allow the users to make corrections to the listings and then have some way to make that visible in the ranking. They are definitely pursuing more user input which he hoped would provide an ultimate reduction of the frustration levels. They are also putting in place techniques to prevent abuse. Their general philosophy is that there are more good people than bad but that the bad are very motivated, and that with the right balance of technology they can have high confidence in the data.

The bottom line for me was that Google is well aware of the problems with categories provided by the Local Business and they have both short term and longer term solutions in the works to solve them. There is no doubt in my mind as to their sincerity or their effort.

Skepticism is an attribute that I give up only grudgingly and even though I am not from Missouri, I am of the “show me” sort. It is clear that a straight up flat, categorization system will not be sufficient to meet searcher needs in the age of internet expectations. I assume that the transition from this relatively flat structure to the more flexible taxonomy that Google is speaking about is one of the friction points currently causing problems.

While I believe Carter when he says that the results will improve over time, after struggling with this issue for 18 months it is not clear how much time there is and one can only hope that the short term fixes go a long way toward resolving these issues.

There are changes coming and coming soon. Hopefully they will be improvements that will make our jobs easier, but that is to be seen. If nothing else it, sounds like the next few months working with Google Maps will be exciting.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.

Everybody seems to agree that the future of mobile computing will look something like the iPhone. I posited here that something as functional as the iPhone would be ubiquitous in 4-5 years. Greg Sterling has frequently noted the iPhone as the direction the industry needs to take for increased adoption, Google has often mentioned its success with the iPhone, and the NY Times reported the Christmas surge that the iPhone and its browser brought.

Jobs highlighted a number of announcements that affect the future of mobile computing, and an iPhone upgrade was but one of them. According to Jobs “…we have sold 4 million iPhones to date,” a leading 19% of the smartphone market. He demonstrated the many updates to the iPhone, including Google’s new software.

The iPhone is not Apple’s only foray into mobile computing. The Apple iPod Touch has become one of its big sellers. The iPod touch is being upgraded to include a number of mobile internet apps, including “Mail, maps, stocks, notes, and weather!” and the ability to determine location by using nearby WiFi network signals.

The new Macbook Air provides a full functioning computer as a mobile device. “So thin it fits inside a yellow manila envelope!,” but with built-in iSight, full-size keyboard, and a full-size 13.3″ wide screen display. It ships with Core 2 Duo, 1.6 and 1.8GHz options, ships with 80GB standard, optional 64GB solid state disk “a little pricey but fast!” With 5 hours of battery life, it should be a mobile beast even if it is $3100 with SSD hard drive.

While nobody really knows what the future hardware for mobile computing will look like, Apple seems to be taking us there faster than anybody, and they are hedging their bets in both form factor and function with a multi-prong approach to the mobile internet: the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and the new Macbook Air.

Whether Apple products will ultimately dominate the various forms of mobile computing or whether they will just define them is to be seen. They are, however, moving on multiple fronts toward the future where local search is in your pocket or briefcase 24/7. Thanks to ArsTechnica and Engadget for their real time reporting—more coverage on Techmeme.

Mike Blumenthal is a student of life, political economy and local search. He writes the blog Understanding Google Maps and Yahoo Local Search and is a partner in a small web design company in upstate NY.