Last month, Vic Gundotra, VP of Engineering, demonstrated at the Computer History Museum the capability to search by using your location as the query. Now, you can try this yourself by going to Google.com in your iPhone or Android browser and clicking on "Near me now" once your location has been provided by your phone.
"Near me now" was intended to address two user problems. First, Google wanted to make it fast and easy to find out more about a place in your immediate vicinity, whether you're standing right in front of a business or if it's just a short walk away. For example, you may want to know what other clients think about a restaurant before you go inside (see quick video below) or what they have been raving about on the menu before you order. By selecting the "Explore right here" option, you can find out more about a place "right here" with not many clicks.
Second, Google wanted to make searching for popular categories of nearby places really simple. Imagine that you emerge from the subway station and you want to take a coffee, but you don't see a coffee shop around you. You can merely search for all nearby coffee shops by using "Near me now". To search other categories of places not shown, "Browse more categories" provides access to our local search product with more groups of choices.
"Near me now" is at present available in the US for iPhone (OS 3.x) or Android-powered devices with version 2.0.1 or later. You must first allow location in order for "Near me now" to appear, and "Explore right here" works only if the phone provides location accuracy within approximately a city block.
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