Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues to poke its head into the location-based marketplace. The internet search leader has made multiple efforts to provide products and services that let users track friends, family and themselves. While these are cool products and rather big-brotherish at the same time, there is an ulterior motive here: data collection.

If you're a Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) user, you probably enjoy the relatively high quality of the company's products at t cost of -- zero. How does Google give all this away for free, you ask? It's the same as any other company on the web that features quality products at no cost. The cost is your privacy. You are paying, and paying big.

Do you mind? It's hard to say what kind of personal, financial and psychological profile Google has on millions of its customers, but you can believe that this massive marketing database exists. How Google manages this will be the most important decision in the company's young, decade-old existence, but the question remains: do many of us sell our souls for freebies? Every time you sign up for something free but fill out a complete demographic profile to get it, you're selling out. Google is doing nothing different -- but its scale is so huge that all this data controlled by one entity does cause for concern among the informed consumer inside us all. It should, anyway.

Google, like anyone in business who is savvy, knows that giving away products or services for "free" on the front end is made up for on the back end. In other words, would you rather pay for every single product or service you use and not have any entity know how to market to you -- or would you rather get a good majority of your products and services at no cost but with the attached condition that there are many entities out there that know you better than you know yourself?

More importantly, they know how to push your exact buttons to have you behaving like a robotic consumer or a slot machine junkie? With the U.S. consumer responsible for two-thirds of economic activity (as little as that is at the moment), the harnessing of this kind of power becomes clear. Okay, I'm off to perform a Google search...

Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues to make billions in revenue each quarter on the back of its extensive text advertising network used on various Google properties as well as partner websites. The argument can still be made that the large majority of Google's income rests on the back of those simple ads which can be eerily relevant and lucrative for those who advertise on Google's network. One area, though, that has fallen by the wayside in recent years is the importance of Google ads in its Gmail email service.

Although competitor Yahoo, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) still has a larger customer base of email users, Google's Gmail product counts tens of millions of global, more affluent users. Although the company gives almost all its products away for free, you won't see advertising inside most of them.

It's no secret that Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is trying to undermine Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ: MSFT) software business at every turn. Although Google continues to be non-chalant about it, the company's "software as a service" approach to competing with Microsoft's established "software on your PC approach" is popular in many circles, but still doesn't seem to be affecting Microsoft's revenue stream.

Microsoft's Windows Vista is the pre-installed operating system on almost every PC sold in the world, and its corporate selling of the Microsoft Office package continues to be one of the company's cash cows, even with similar competitive software given away for free. One of Microsoft's corporate staples is its Exchange Server product, which lets all those installations of Outlook on millions of business desktops access company email. What if all those copies of Outlook could be using email, calendaring and contact management from Google's freely available Gmail service?

Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is upgrading its corporate e-mail offering as of this week, and the search company is adding new security tools as well as doubling the online storage capacity. This move probably comes as a response to Yahoo!, Inc.'s (NASDAQ: YHOO) planned purchase of corporate e-mail provider Zimbra in addition to getting something out the door from the Postini acquisition a few months back.

Now that Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) is still in the fray with its Exchange corporate e-mail solution and Yahoo! has entered into the dance with the Zimbra buy, Google's timing here is impeccable. But, are the Microsoft and Yahoo! solutions better than Google just beefing up security and adding more storage to its existing online corporate e-mail offering? That's up to each customer to decide, although anytime, anywhere, secure and easy access to e-mail is probably at the forefront of each corporate user's mind these days.

Business software is an area relatively new to Google, but with the company having acquired email security firm Postini for over $600 million recently, it must market and tout that technology to every business customer it can, starting now. A simple explanation of "increased corporate security" is not enough, and if Google is serious about challenging both Microsoft and Yahoo! in the business e-mail space, it has to start making large waves. A doubling of e-mail inbox capacity is a great start, but it's just that -- the start.

Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ:GOOG) pervasiveness in this day and age is unmistakable. In several conferences last year, I repeatedly heard CEO Eric Schmidt say that one of Google's top priorities is the mobile sector -- the cellphone screen to be blunt.

With that said, Google has scored a major hit. The world's leading Internet search engine has signed a deal with the world's largest mobile carrier -- China Mobile -- to have Google's mobile website featured prominently for China Mobile customers.

China Mobile -- with over 200 million paying customers -- will now have Google's mobile presence sitting on it as customers in that country use high-speed cellular handsets to do Internet-related tasks. Unlike here in the U.S., much of the Pacific Rim uses mobile technology for Internet access (instead of PCs), so this is quite the deal for Google.

If you haven't checked out Google's website for your mobile, point your handset's browser to www.google.com/xhtml and you can see what it looks like. Will Google reign supreme over the coming mobile Internet access explosion (that is already happening in some parts of the world)?

Google, Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) is once again trying to get more customers using its venerable email service -- dubbed Gmail -- as the search giant has released a new mobile version of its Gmail client as a Java download for mobile phones as of today.

Although Google's Gmail service has been available for almost a year through the wireless web browser built into most cellphones these days, this is the company's first attempt at an actual downloadable and installable application (the app is a J2ME download) that is installable by visiting www.gmail.com/app on your mobile phone's wireless web browser.

Google execs have said many, many times in the last year that it believes the mobile phone has more potential than the PC for internet access in global markets. It's not hard to see why, since mobile phones are much more numerous than PCs in most countries these days.

Well, now it's got the goods and the masses have their cellphones. It's a marriage waiting to happen -- but the two first have to meet. The company's next challenge is getting the message out to the people. I've said many times that Google fails to properly market newer services as best it can -- only to see uptake falter after initial hype.

How many of you are Yahoo! email subscribers? I am willing to bet some of you are, even though AOL and Google both now offer gigabytes of free storage and a free email address as well, hoping to steal memory-hogging Yahoo!ites away. After all, Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) does operate the world's largest consumer email service, with something like a quarter-billion email accounts. So, when changes come to Yahoo! mail, you can be sure they've been thoroughly thought-out.

After having used the new email service recently, I can say that it is much improved in terms of overall functionality than the previous version of Yahoo! mail. Yahoo!'s new service emulates a desktop email product like Microsoft Outlook, but is completely web-based. I won't go into the web-based AJAX technology behind it, but it certainly allows for a very clean email experience if you've used a desktop email program before (most of us have, is not still). Although I find Yahoo!'s mail very slow compared to Google's Gmail (which I use), it is still very usable.

The single-largest thorn in my side about using Yahoo!'s mail service is the non-relevant advertising that seems to occupy way too much of the visible real estate on the screen (unless you're using a 21-inch screen or something). Yahoo! seems to have ported its advertising strategy from the previous Yahoo! mail to the new version -- and I find it incredibly annoying. But, then again, Yahoo!'s mail service is very private -- the company does not scan customer email to provide advertising (hence, the non-relevancy).

So, for annoying and graphical ads, you get privacy - as opposed to Google's Gmail, which is very streamlined and fast, but somewhat invades privacy when Google's automated software provides text ads based on message content. Which do you choose? Let's not forget that AOL recently unveiled a 2GB free email address to anyone who wants one as well -- but I haven't used it that much yet.

Business Week Online has an interesting article about spam and what email providers are doing to protect us from spam.

A spam watchdog group in the U.K. has an interesting case that went against it. The company maintains a Blacklist of of spamming companies, but it just lost a case and was ordered to pay $11.7 million in damages to e360insight because the company said it suffered damages from being included on the list. The company denied this vehemently and has vowed not to pay as the court has no jurisdiction over it.

The Radicati Group has claimed that an average company will spend $257 per email account to fight spam in 2007.

Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE: TWX) AOL concurs. The Internet company doesn't keep exact figures on its spam costs according to the article, but Charles Stiles, AOL's postmaster, was quoted as acknowledging "a lot of resources" were going into filtering spam from members' accounts. This article has some startling figures: Of the 4.5 billion messages AOL processes per day, between 75% and 80% are blocked as spam. In 2005 the company blocked 556 billion e-mails as spam -- up from 500 billion in 2003.

What's more, users are spending larger amounts of time and money to keep unsolicited e-mail in check. The network strains can affect the overall price of Internet connections, because ISPs must deal with the added network traffic. Spam filters or security systems that come with spam blockers typically cost between $20 and $40 a year. The filters help, sometimes blocking as much as 80% of spam, but they don't nix it all.

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) has been trying to protect its MSN service from being swarmed with spam, but it has really been to no avail. They use Japan's Trend Micro (TMIC) in their fight. While it captures a lot of the spam, you would be shocked at the number of obvious spams that sneak through with titles such as "Bigger Willy" and wonderful things like this.

VeriSign (VRSN) has also alluded to the fact that this also can ruin a brand image. After having numerous attempts from fake eBay and PayPal emails, this goes without saying. This problem is getting worse and worse, and many countries outside the U.S. will not do anything to stop the creators.

Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ: GOOG) GMAIL has been noted as one of the best free email solutions out there, although emails from fraud Nigerian businessmen claiming to need help getting a dead clients funds out of teh country still make it through their spam filters with regularity.

Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) has just recently made announcements that they have been upgrading their systems, and they need it. Their non-targeted email allows a lot in and you should see how many emails can start accumulating if left untended.

McAfee (MFE) currently has partners to the tune of Microsoft, IBM, Dell, Time Warner's AOL, and Cisco Systems (CSCO).

Say you have an attachment to a Gmail email message you receive. No longer do you need yet another piece of software to open and listen to the audio file. Gmail users can now hear MP3 attachments directly in their web browsers through a Gmail popup window. Email-attached MP3 audio files are streaming using Google's Flash-based audio player, with no other software required.

What's the significance of this? For starters, I believe it's Google's way of subtly letting the world know that it is experimenting with taking certain functions many hundreds of millions of computer users rely on daily off of the desktop environment and into the browser. It's no secret -- or maybe it is -- that Google wishes to try and duplicate (read: replace) many locally-installed programs like audio players, spreadsheets and word processors with online versions used exclusively through a web browser.

In one sense, Google's attempt -- early in the game -- to bypass Microsoft's programs and bring the most-used applications direct to customers over the web is startling, even if it's incredibly low-key at this time. Sure, Google can't just replace the "operating system" layer in a computer that melds software and hardware communications. But beyond that, its attempts to mimic other installed pieces of software is causing my rather large eyebrows to curl a little.

Brian White has worked in various executive positions in technology and telecommunications and now focuses on editing and writing.

Google is making its free web-based Gmail email service available to Japanese customers in their native language, the company said today. The new Gmail Japan service is open to every customer who wants it, as the sign-on process is not limited to testers or even customers from Japan. When Gmail launched on the scene back in 2004 to U.S. residents (and anyone with web access, really), competitors Yahoo! and Microsoft finally were dragged out of the "4MB inbox limit" doldrums and were forced to respond almost overnight to match the offering, a free 1GB email inbox with free POP access -- meaning you could access your Gmail account with Microsoft Outlook, for example.

Google's Gmail service has since expanded to a whopping 2.7 GB of storage, which means that most of us who use Gmail will never need to delete another message, unless you've a heavy user of email attachments. Japanese residents can now receive that same glory in the Japanese language, and they are joined by other Gmail users who use Gmail in over 40 languages these days.

With Google opening up the Japanese version of Gmail for free to anyone right off the bat, Google continues to stab hard at the advertising market that comes along with Gmail. That is, text advertisements that are displayed to the right of email messages, similar to how the wildly-successful text advertising messages are displayed next to Google searches -- a business model that pumps in billions of revenue dollars every quarter into Google's coffers. If Google can receive the same level of success with Gmail-based text advertising, and more Gmail users sign up, more billions may be on the way. After all, email is the #1 thing Internet users do as an activity, right?

Brian White has worked in various executive positions in technology and telecommunications and now focuses on editing and writing.

After just reading the latest issue of BusinessWeek, I was intrigued about the cover story -- which prominently figures Google VP Marissa Mayer, an AI and software engineering expert who also has an uncanny knack for releasing products that work sleekly, efficiently and are incredibly simple to use. For many people critical of Google Spreadsheet, I see it for its simplicity and usefulness for the tens of millions who are intimidated by Microsoft Excel and all the lavish functions it offers. Sure, there is a place for both products -- but they are targeting, for the most part, different audiences. Therein lies the "innovation" moniker that continues being placed on the Google folks.

Every tried Google's Gmail or Google Calendar? Both are fantastically easy to use and learn with very little configuration and tweaking. Compared to the incredible amount of settings in Microsoft Outlook, both Gmail and Google Calendar are, for many people, highly innovative and useful. One thing gearheads and power users tend to forget is that not everyone needs complex functionality out of their software -- whether locally-installed or web-based.

After reading this blog post, several question leaped to mind regarding many of the newer Google products that have surfaced recently, and why some of them have not gained the marketshare they've probably earned. Well, it all comes down to familiarity with many customers: there are many who argue that Google's Gmail service is the far-superior web-based email product, and it beats Yahoo! Mail and easily creams Microsoft's Hotmail with its speed and ease-of -use. So, two years after becoming available (not to the general public until recently), why hasn't Gmail upped its marketshare?

While this blog post -- and Google itself -- has said that Google's products are generally launched while not complete, I think Google hopes that by version three of four, the kinks will have been ironed out and people will flock to the product, whatever it is. Well, this is misguided thinking. There are plenty of examples of clearly-superior products not making inroads to established competitive products. Many customers are creatures of habit, and once they use a product or service for a while, the old "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" saying comes into play.

What about potential Office-killers like Google Calendar and the just-announced Google Spreadsheet application? Can these services gain customers by virtue of simply existing? Perhaps -- Google's search dominance has blossomed over the years due to a superior product and largely by viral marketing (and the press' obsession has not hurt, either). But can this situation translate into usage success for newer Google products? Gmail is gaining popularity and such, and other Google programs are just starting to walk. As usual, time will tell whether Google's past success can translate further into new and future Google products.

While Google has hinted at not really being a direct competitor to Microsoft, it has a strange way of showing it. As Sarah blogged on yesterday, Google has just announced a spreadsheet web-based application (as opposed to a locally-installed program) that will do away with the non-centralized editing that generally has to be done with Microsoft Excel.

Who hasn't created an Excel worksheet that needed to be sent around to many people as an email attachment? Google hopes to bypass this wary situation and create a spreadsheet program that is web-based and centralized for sharing among as many people as possible. Although Microsoft has hinted at online collaboratin with its Office suite, either it's been s dismal failure in implementation, or this feature has been marketed really badly. Up steps Google to bring online spreadsheet functionality to the collaborative environment, then.

In fact, Google says that the sharing aspect is central to the new web-based application's reason for existing in the first place. With Google's acquisition of online word processor Writely, and with Gmail and Google Calendar now being available, it seems that Google is systematically taking on Microsoft's core consumer products one by one. Although the new Google spreadsheet application will be available in a limited release at first, expect this new product to be live to the general public sometime this year.