August 8, 2007

Big News from Google

Steve Rubel at Micropersuasion comments on some very big news from Google News, in a post today titled Google News Now Has Feedback, Editing and More Risk. Read on for details...

Google News in the US has added a new feature that, while promising, is sure to be controversial. Google plans to roll it out globally once they iron out the kinks.

Any person mentioned in a news story that Google News indexes can email in their comments to news-comments@google.com. Those who do so will be asked to verify their identity and organizational affiliation. There's more in the Google FAQ here and here.

Once Google approves the comments, they are posted and are attached to the story as an addendum, as you can see from the image above or live on the web here. It's unclear if these comments will also roll up into Google Universal Search results.

This is certainly a boon for PR professionals who have longed for a way to respond to what is largely an automated system. Wikipedia needs a similar mechanism. Google is also fairly liberal in the sources it aggregates. It includes lots of homegrown sites and blogs. This approach, while managed manually, certainly gives companies and subjects a voice on a critical site that is increasingly a big gateway for lots of news/blog content.

Still, there are some big outstanding questions...