I Didn't Know This Dept.
Mary Ellen Bates is a respected information consultant. I receive an e-newsletter from her, and this month's issue had this bit that I think is pretty cool: "If you are based in the US, you can search for local companies through your cell phone, regardless of whether or not your phone has web capability. If you call 1-800-GOOG411 (1-800-466-4411), you will be asked to say the city and state you want information on - Boulder, Colorado, for example - then you say the type of business or specific business name you want - for example, "book store" or "Barnes and Noble". A text-to-speech program will read you the top eight results from its local search ( http://local.google.com/ ). If you want, Google can automatically dial any of the first eight businesses' phone number, or you can ask to have the address and phone number read to you." (From Bates Information Services, www.BatesInfo.com/tip.html ) A visit to the Google website for this service repeated...