Die mobile Ausgabe der lokalen Suchmaschine Google Maps kann nun auch per Spracheingabe gesteuert werden. Allerdings befindet sich dieser Dienst noch im Test und ist bislang nur in den USA für wenige Handy-Modelle verfügbar.

Wie die Google-Mitarbeiter Jonathan Matus und Luca Zanolin im Google Mobile Blog berichten, können Besitzer von Black-Berry-Geräten (Pearl 8110, 8120 und 8130) in den USA nun ihre lokale Suchanfrage nach Unternehmen ins Handy sprechen, statt sie über die Tastatur einzugeben.

Besonders praktisch sei diese Art der Suche dann, wenn man gerade nicht tippen könne, der Name des Unternehmens lang sei oder man nicht wisse, wie der Name buchstabiert werde. Die Suche per Stimme sei einfach. Man halte – nachdem man die Kartenansicht auf den eigenen Standort zentriert habe – die Sprachwahltaste auf der linken Seite des Black-Berry und spreche den Namen oder die Branche des gesuchten Unternehmens. Darauf hin lasse man den Knopf wieder los, worauf die Spracherkennungstechnik die Frage interpretiere und das gewünschte Unternehmen finde.

Dieses neue Google-Maps-Feature nutzt die gleiche Spracherkennungstechnik wie die kostenlose computergesteuerte Telefonauskunft GOOG-411 des Suchmaschinenriesen (wir berichteten), erklären Matus und Zanolin. Allerdings scheint die Genauigkeit noch nicht vollständig zu überzeugen, denn die beiden Googler versprechen auch, dass sich die Technik im Laufe der Zeit, wenn mehr Leute diese Suchfunktion per Spracheingabe nutzen, verbessern werde.

Google and Tele Atlas have signed a long term collaboration. As detailed in a press release from Tele Atlas, the two undertakings closed a 5 year deal at the end of June 2008.

The deal grants Google access to the cartographic material of the Netherlands-Belgian map maker. The search engine giant will be able to use this for its present and future map-based services and navigation facilities, for its internet and desktop services (Google Maps and Google Earth) as well as for mobile applications such as Google Maps for Mobile (mobile.google.de).

Tele Atlas in turn receives access to user corrections and suggestions gathered from the Google user community. Tele Atlas plans to use this data to optimize the quality of their map production. Details of the financial arrangement were not revealed by Tele Atlas.

The Association of German Information and Directory Media (VDAV) recently presented the German Directory Media Prize 2008.

As reported by the VDAV, the winner was announced during the VDAV-BranchMeet, a congress of the German directory media industry, which took place from 18 -20 June 2008 in Bremen. The ‘Branch Oscars’ were assigned in three categories for especially innovative products and applications.

In the ‘Electronic Directory Media’, the victor was the free mobile phone navigation Ö-Navi, a product of DasÖrtliche. This free software has been on offer by the telecommunications directory portal since mid-2007, with which one can effectively convert a mobile phone into a navigation device. Financed entirely through adverts, the user receives not only a route description, but also has access to the entire online-database of DasÖrtliche, therewith all private and business addresses and is able to connect this data to the navigation interface.

The decision of the award for second place was deemed problematic by the 6-person jury, resulting in a tie for 2nd place. The first of the ’silver’ prizes went to the mobile version of meinestadt.de. The mobile version of the town-portal was praised by VDAV, according to its operators Allesklar.com AG, especially for its wide-spectrum offering of local information, including their mobile ’situations vacant’ section and the ability to receive job training classifieds, via free SMS.

The 2nd ‘Silver’ trophy went to the online-cooperation between the association “gesundheitstadt berlin” (en=’health city berlin’) and the branch portal “gewusst wo” (en=’knowing where’). The operators of gewusst-wo.de, the publications group Beleke, announced this in a press release.

Alongside the digital sphere, prizes were also awarded to print media and marketing-events. All prize winners can be found on the VDAV website.

At the beginning of March 2008, the local ratings platform GoLocal.de was launched (see our report). And as then announced, its operators GoLocal GmbH&Co. KG (a daughter of GoYellow Media AG) implemented a mobile version of this Web2.0 portal in June 2008.

As detailed by the operators in a press release, the whole ‘desktop’ offering is now available in a mobile equivalent (accessed at m.golocal.de) and useable on any internet-ready mobile device.

GoLocal mobile phone or PDA users can now search for providers in a chosen town, such as businesses, restaurants or doctors, call up event listings and also view the location of the generated results on a map.  To do this, one enters the desired ‘location’ (town/postal code and a key word, and a list of results is presented. An aside– in our test, the entry of a street name as a search word did not work for us. Pity too, that there is no Route Planner.

As to be expected for a ratings portal, the user can call up location rankings assigned by fellow users, as well as creating further ratings themselves.  Anyone is able to score short ratings, without being registered. Whoever so wishes, can choose from preselected key words and assigned up to 5 stars.  In order to rate in more detail, registration is required.  Using the mobile version of GoLocal.de, the same username and password as the desktop-version are valid. Members can also save their most-liked locations under ‘Favorites’, save interesting events (under ‘My Events’) or flag specific locations under the ‘Notes’ (de=’Merkzettel’) section.

A report by the British market-research institute Juniper Research, predicts a strong growth in the use of mobile-based Local Search services in the year ahead.