There continues to be a lot of buzz about location data and local search. Both Google and Yahoo have developed services giving any, website using the code, the power to know a visitors location, including mobile devices and even without using a GPS. Google is doing this with their Gears Geolocaiton API and Yahoo! with their Fire Eagle service.
The new Gears Geolocation API can find your mobile device using cell phone towers that are close by or via your phones GPS. For PCs it uses the computers IP address. What advantage does this give users? Google uses the example of the European travel site LastMinute.com. The site has a location enabled restaurant finder for cell phones used to find restaurants near you.
Google states the location is not saved in anyway, but is simply used to provide more relevant search results. Websites must ask if it’s OK to track your location, and of course Google suggestion exercising caution when visiting sites you are not familiar with. So far Gears only works with Internet Explorer on Windows Mobile devices. For desktops IE or Firefox can be used. Google claims that the use of their API reduces the amount of time it takes to enter your location data each time you visit a site.
Yahoo’s Fire Eagle allows people to direct their phone to use location based information for third party sites. Or you can manually enter your data in the Yahoo system.
Maybe the scenes in sci-fi movies where you walk past a sign, it knows who you are and gives you a personalized message are not so far away. Could our phones be used to do this?
