Today Google released functionality in the Mobile Maps product that will geolocate a cellphone based on the nearby celltowers called My Location. Your location shows up as a blue dot on the map. The Google Maps application will also use GPS to supplement. Since it is using celltowers your location should work internationally — it all depends on the data.
I just downloaded and installed the new application. It knew my location instantly — within a block. My house has always shown up a block off on Google Maps and I have not fixed it yet. I then reset so my location. This activated my phone’s GPS and my location became accurate within a couple of meters.
Google Mobile Maps is available for Nokia phones, Blackberries, MS Smartphones, and phones that support Java. It does not support the iPhone much to the chargin of this lonely poster on the Maps Discussion board. To get the app point your mobile browser at http://google.com/gmm.
Google does not store your location and even if it did Google claims that they could not determine identity from a handset. This implies that they are not going to use our locations in aggregate. I am really surprised. That data could really be worth something.
Google is not the first to collect celltower data. Google acquisition Jaiku let users add a name (but not location) to celltowers. Intel Research also experimented with geo-locating cell towers with their PlaceLab project. It constantly boggles my mind how often Google picks up a discarded research project from another company and turns it into a newsworthy product or feature (the most noteworthy of these being Microsoft’s Terra Server being trumped by Google Maps).
What will be really key is when a user’s location becomes accessible all the time and by any application on the cellphone. The current implementation appears to only let your location be accessible by Google Maps and only when the program is running. This may happen in Android. As Googler Ed Parsons has pointed out, LBS is a key component:
With Android the Location Manager component is part of the core application framework, meaning that all user applications have access to the devices location. At a simple level this means that applications like the address book as access to the device location, so your contacts rather than sorted alphabetically could be sorted based on distance from your locations.
Until Android is released we can expect to get peeks at functionality via Google’s existing mobile apps. So what does this peek potentially tell us? Not only will Android apps be able to support location data, there is also going to be a Google service for determining a user’s location. Is this a possible source of revenue to supplement the assumed ad-model?
After the jump I have reposted some interesting questions answered in the MyLocation Help Center
Will Google always know where I am if I use My Location (beta)?
No. A handset’s approximate location is not saved on our servers or in our logs. Also, all handsets are anonymous, and our system is not aware of repeat visits from the same handset or that an individual handset has traveled from one location to another.
Is My Location (beta) available for my device?
At this time, My Location (beta) is available for these devices:
* BlackBerry devices
* Some recent Motorola devices
* Some recent Sony Ericsson devices
* Many Windows Mobile devices
* Nokia Series 60 3rd Edition devices
If you have a Java-enabled (J2ME) device, BlackBerry or Windows Mobile device, you can easily check whether or not My Location (beta) is available. Just to go “Help” > “About” from the application. If the box contains “myl: N/A,” it means your device isn’t reporting a cell.
How accurate is My Location (beta)?
Mobile towers are placed by operators throughout an area to provide coverage for their users. Each of these towers has its own individual coverage area, usually split into three non-overlapping sections known as “cells.” These cells come with identification numbers, but no location information. Google takes geo-contextual information [from anonymous GPS-readings, etc] and associates this information with the cell at that location to develop a database of cell locations. Based on this information, Google uses various algorithms to approximate your location relative to the cells nearest you. The accuracy of this information depends on how big an individual cell is. Thus, areas with a denser concentration of mobile towers allow for a more accurate My Location reading. Additionally, as our database of cell locations continues to improve, so too does the accuracy and coverage of the My Location feature.