| Here is what its all about. I would bet you 10/1 that google does have plans to take this nation wide. Think of what they have to gain. Think of what every other information source short of major publications uses as a source of income. Bingo... advertising. None of them charge you to use the service, they charge businesses for advertisement placement. Now take into account the fact that many Americans now "surf the net" in their spare time as apposed to watching TV.
All google is doing is taking the respective place of TV networks to provide advertisement to local businesses in the fastest growing consumer market. The market at this point being the net, which does not yet have ANY dominate marketing programs. It is in some respects like watching the rebirth of a company like NBC. The fact is that Googles model has more to offer local business then even cable or network TV could ever dream of. The ability to have advertisements based on the exact location of the end user has to be a very attractive idea to business in general.
As for wether Google plans to share the wealth so to say, proposition other companies to take similar models. This is a whole other argument in itself. |
