To help feed its insatiable information hunger, Google Inc. has begun publicly testing Google Base, a service designed to host and make searchable “all types of online and offline content,” the Mountain View, California, company announced.Described as an extension of existing Google content collection efforts, such as Web crawl, Google Base can be used by large companies and individuals alike to post data in the form of categorized items that Google will host and make searchable for free, wrote Bindu Reddy, a company product manager, in Google’s official Web blog shortly after midnight Wednesday EST.“This beta version of Google Base is another small step toward our goal, creating an online database of easily searchable, structured information,” Reddy wrote.People who post items to Google Base are asked to classify them with keywords or phrases, which Google calls labels, and to describe them with terms, which Google calls attributes. In this way, Google appears to have made its most concrete move to date into the realm of user-generated content and tagging, popularized by services such as the Del.icio.us social-bookmarking site and Yahoo Inc.’s Flickr photo-sharing site.The range of items that can be posted on Google Base is broad, encompassing such disparate things as poems, events, recipes, research papers, products and job postings, according to information on the Google Base Web site (http://base.google.com). In addition to appearing on Google Base, items posted there could also surface in Google’s main Web index, the Froogle comparison shopping site and the Google Local listing of businesses. By Juan Carlos Perez, IDG News Service Related content feature LexisNexis rises to the generative AI challenge With generative AI, the legal information services giant faces its most formidable disruptor yet. That’s why CTO Jeff Reihl is embracing and enhancing the technology swiftly to keep in front of the competition. By Paula Rooney Dec 01, 2023 6 mins Generative AI Generative AI Generative AI feature 10 business intelligence certifications and certificates to advance your BI career From BI analysts and BI developers to BI architects and BI directors, business intelligence pros are in high demand. Here are the certifications and certificates that can give your career an edge. By Thor Olavsrud Dec 01, 2023 8 mins Certifications Business Intelligence IT Skills brandpost Sponsored by Huawei Beyond gigabit: the need for 10 Gbps in business networks Interview with Liu Jianning, Vice President of Huawei's Data Communication Marketing & Solutions Sales Dept By CIO Online Staff Nov 30, 2023 9 mins Cloud Architecture Networking brandpost Sponsored by SAP Generative AI’s ‘show me the money’ moment We’re past the hype and slick gen AI sales pitches. Business leaders want results. By Julia White Nov 30, 2023 5 mins Artificial Intelligence Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe