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Google Opens U.K. Cybercafe and Testing Lab
sebFlyte writes "Google has launched a new venture in England to go with its London offices. They've set up a free Web cafe style affair at London's Heathrow airport to help travelers claw back some of the many hours they spend aimlessly wandering round airport lounges. They're not doing it entirely selflessly though: they admit the main reason they're doing it is to get as wide and as large a cross section of people through the centre as they can so that they can then watch them interact with Google's Web applications. ZDNet has photos, too."
Perhaps it's also to promote Firefox as well? I noticed that the browser used in the screenshots was Firefox. I wonder if Firefox is the only thing installed, or if Internet Explorer is also on there?
oh yeah, of course. hey, advertising is their main revenue source. still pretty cool to put a free service where there are a lot of bored people though. I also doubt they will lose those cutting edge type services, they like their cutting edge stuff and have enough cash for now
Googlespace is not a free Internet cafe. You are limited on the Samsung laptops to Google sites. This means that you can do google searches to your heart's content, but that you can't go to the results.
As I'm already familiar with Google's applications, I wandered off.
Wireless access in Heathrow Terminal 1 is already provided by T-Mobile.
Heathrow T1 is heavily covered by commercial hot-spots. I can't imagine anyone (except the passengers) being happy if Google offered free coverage. There were people there, but they were hardly queueing for seats (there was a couple of spaces free when I had my look). However some ten metres away people were happily using a pay-hotspot organised by T-mobile. They could use their own PCs (big advantage). Hey, if the company is paying, where is the problem?
As a frequent flyer, I have access to a lounge. Although the lounge has only pay-hot-spots, they have a free internet cafe and being an airline lounge, free drinks and munchies. There having been a number of delayed flights earlier, the munchies were limited but at least I could sit there with a free orange juice.
> 9 hours a year... Yeesh.
> Makes me glad I don't fly.
The 9 hours a year waiting for travellers at Heathrow I could certainly believe. Problem is all BAA run airports (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Southampton, Edinburgh and probably others) are badly run.
If you're travelling from London much better to fly from the smaller London City Airport, smaller means less queues and the checkin for each flight stays open upto 15 minutes before departure. If you travel airlines that let you check in online (KLM and British Airways spring to mind) then as long as you reach the gate before boarding then you're fine. As it's a small airport it doesn't take long to get to the gate.
Of course being a small airport means less flights, but if there's a destination not served by London City then you can fly KLM via Amsterdam and get to a lot of worldwide destinations, trust me, even with the transfer at Amsterdam Schiphol it's still a lot less hassle than the nightmare that is Heathrow.
The official link for this project, called Google Space, has not yet been indicated:
l and on two previous /. comments. I submitted this story a few days ago, but I agree with the /. eds, the url I provided were not as interesting as in today's story...
http://www.google.co.uk/googlespace/
It was first mentioned on http://www.ogleearth.com/2005/11/google_space.htm
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