That's a really interesting analysis, and you could well be right. If that does turn out to be the case, I suspect Google figures they will make up the difference by being able to more efficiently target that same information for a different set of ad placements.
GoogleBase, in return for "free" hosting, gets the user to give Google more and better keyword and content data about the information. That enables Google, over the long term, to be able to charge more for ad placement for companies with stuff related to that information.
It's extremely clever. But I think the issue of losing control of your own information does not justify the "free" value.
There is something else going on. By putting something in GoogleBase, you are effectively preventing it from being indexed by any other search engine, which is not at all desirable. So Google wins twice--they can target ads more precisely, and they lock information away from competitors.
GoogleBase and ad revenue
That's a really interesting analysis, and you could well be right. If that does turn out to be the case, I suspect Google figures they will make up the difference by being able to more efficiently target that same information for a different set of ad placements.
GoogleBase, in return for "free" hosting, gets the user to give Google more and better keyword and content data about the information. That enables Google, over the long term, to be able to charge more for ad placement for companies with stuff related to that information.
It's extremely clever. But I think the issue of losing control of your own information does not justify the "free" value.
There is something else going on. By putting something in GoogleBase, you are effectively preventing it from being indexed by any other search engine, which is not at all desirable. So Google wins twice--they can target ads more precisely, and they lock information away from competitors.