Google StreetView coming to Newbury

Here's some interesting news for the people of Newbury. Google have now been given permission to launch their StreetView here in the UK. This means that you will soon be able to use Google to get a street side view of every road and street in Newbury.

As you can imagine, there has been a fierce debate about whether Google should be allowed to do this. Traditionally here in the UK, we are quite protective of our privacy; especially when it comes to our homes and security. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on the side of the fence you sit) the Information Commissioner's Office has our interests at heart by saying:

"adequate safeguards to avoid any risk to the privacy or safety of individuals"

In practice this means that people's faces will be blurred out and car registration numbers will not be shown.

A spokesman for the Internet giant went on to say: “We welcome the comments from the ICO. Street View is a valuable tool for people who wish to better understand a location and find information about the places they live and visit.

"We've always said we will not launch in UK until we are comfortable Street View complies with local law and that we will use technology, like face-blurring, licence plate blurring and operational controls, such as image removal tools, so Street View remains useful and in keeping with local norms wherever it is available”

So, people of Newbury. What is your view on this? Is it a useful tool, will you use it? Or are you worried that in the age of cyber crime, this is just one more way for people to find out about an address?

The Google challenger, is Cuil good for Newbury?

It is not always the best technology that wins the hearts and minds, sometimes it is the company with the deepest marketing budget, or the first to market or the company that executes their sales strategy perfectly. Think VHS v Beta max, Laser disk v DVD, Blue Ray v HDDVD, it's not always the best technology that wins.

I was thinking about this because I have received a number of emails this week that mention the new search engine Cuil (pronounced Cool), which was launched on the back of claims it is better than Google and world domination beckons. With the kind of media coverage they were being given (was it a slow week?), I was really looking forward to giving it a test drive.

And it is a good job I am a patient man; since for the first 24 hours the site would not even load for me. I'm not joking, talk about a massive PR gaff. This is a site that is supposed to rival the most popular search engine on the planet and it could not cope with their own launch party.

Anyway, I wanted to give it a fair shot. In my humble opinion, I really do believe that the search engine war has been fought, casualties are long buried. Yes, sure there will be a need for other search engines, however the core user groups outside of the tech savvy community will stick with Google, it's what they know. Even if some bright spark invented a new system, Google's pockets are so deep that they will bury a disruptive competitor before the mainstream have even heard of them. So if Cuil were coming along to try and rival Google, then they must have some jam hot product to whack us around the ears with?

Since this site is about Newbury SEO, I thought I would test the top 5 most popular Newbury search results using a Cuil search and a Google search. The winner will be the search engine that offers the most helpful results, I know it is not very scientific but we SEOs need to remember sometimes that the huge majority of Internet users are just that, users. They have no special knowledge of how search engines work or desire to.

For for clarity purposes, I am using google.co.uk and cuil.com

1. newbury hotels

The Google result provided local business results which listed 10 Newbury based hotels, there was also a number of other Newbury based hotels listed. The rest of the SERPs were made up of "hotel deal" type sites.

The Cuil result did not provide any Newbury based hotels. The SERPs provided sites that were click through agency type sites, I clicked on a couple of these and they did not even show Newbury hotels, more search refining was needed.

Google wins this one hands down.

2. newbury racecourse

The Cuil results for Newbury Racecourse were not bad here, as well as the main Newbury Racecourse site, they offered up the Wiki and some ticketing information.

The Google result again took advantage of their local presence by offering a map. Their sponsored links provided details of local hotels to stay at and the SERPs had details of rail times and even managed to provide details of the golf course at the racecourse.

This was a little bit tighter, however I would have to opt with Google as it provided more useful information on the first search.

3. newbury college

Both sites offering up very similar information here. Google provided a map and contact details and Cuil offered Wikipedia as a source for additional information. Both answered query adequately.

Point each this time.

4. newbury weekly news

Another point each side, the main vehicle for the Newbury Weekly News is newburytoday.co.uk which was top on both search results. There were a couple of spam style results on the Cuil SERPs, however both gave adequate information.

5. newbury show

The Newbury Show has been superseded by the Royal County of Berkshire show, however a lot of locals still know it as Newbury Show. Both search engines had the main site top of their results, however Cuil had a lot of non relevant information, some as old as 2001. Google offered up lots of news coverage and related sites.

Google win this one.

So in summary and based on the strict criteria of my opinion, Google are providing more relevant search results for terms that relate to Newbury. This may change in the future, however for now there is nothing that Cuil are doing for the people looking for Newbury based information that is better than Google. So I can only imagine that they must have a huge trick up their sleeve if they are serious about disrupting Google as the number one search engine.