Under the Google® services and tools web page, users have access to a wide variety of products, from email to mapping to word-processing applications. Google® also offers beta software that is not ready for official release through the Google® services and tools section, but these products can be used and tested by the general public. One example of this beta software is Google® Base, which is an online database that allows users to upload content to Google®.
Users are free to add any type of content they wish to Google® through Google® Base; people can upload links to websites, images, text, software, music, or videos. The content is uploaded to the database through an application programming interface (API) that Google® provides, or users can upload through various file transfer protocol (FTP) methods. After uploading the content, Google® indexes the data and allows others to search for that data. Google® may incorporate the new content into its mapping tool, shopping software, or web search tool if they find that the content is relevant. Google® does not charge users for this service.
When uploading the content, users should add attributes to the data to improve the content’s visibility. Attributes are metadata that provides additional information about what the content is. For example, a typical attribute for a picture of an oak tree may be “tree:oak.”
Google® Base places some restrictions on the content that users can upload, which are defined in the terms of service. For example, when posting advertisements, users cannot upload fraudulent or deceptive material, including chain letters or pyramid schemes. Users cannot upload copyrighted media, such as music, software, and videos, unless the person is the owner of that media. The content cannot have any malicious code, such as virus, worms, or spyware. Google® may reject content that violates any of the terms of service, and that data will not be uploaded to the database.
After uploading data to Google® Base, content owners can see how often their information comes up in searches. Google® provides statistics on the impressions and clicks for the content. Impressions refers to the number of times the content has appeared in searches since the data was published. Clicks refers to the number of times a person clicked on the content during a search since the data was published.