New research performedby the Bank of England has indicated that Internet searches performed using Google have helped accurately predict how unemployment and house prices will change in the future. By monitoring search terms including “estate agent”, “mortgage”, “unemployed” and “jobseekers allowance” and collating the frequency of searches over a number of years, researchers are able to compare results to house values and unemployment figures at those times, producing results that in many cases beat surveys of public opinion....

In yet anotherstruggle with Chinese authorities, Google is in the process of trying to get approval to keep their maps online in China. With a looming deadline of July 1, Google has to get China’s stamp of approval, otherwise it could find itself faced with legal action. China introduced the new regulation, requiring a state license in order to operate maps in the country. While it has been confirmed that Google has applied for the license, the application is still under review....

It’s been a while since Google Shopper became available on the Android platform. For months, we Android fans have been able to use it to find products by image, voice or even scanning. But now, iPhone users get to have some fun as well. According to theGoogle Mobile blog, Google Shopper is now available in theApp Storeand you can have all of the same features that Android fans enjoy: With barcode scanning and search by voice, it’s extremely simple to find the product that you want at the best price....

Google’s executive chairman Eric Schmidt believes the company should have focused more on connecting its users, to compete with market-leading Facebook before it became the world’s most popular social network, he revealed in aninterview with CNN. Schmidt said that Facebook has succeeded because it had “worked out who people are” and that the system was fundamentally missing from the Internet: What Facebook has done is built a way to figure out who people are....

Google today closed down access toAndroid 3.0 Honeycomb‘s source code, saying that it didn’t want developers using it in ‘unauthorized’ ways. The move comes shortly after a member of theXDA Developersforum installed Honeycomb on a phone anddiscovered the unreleased Google Musicapp. Google often cites Android’s openness as a selling point over alternatives such as Apple’siOS. Google’s claim that developers could use the source code in unauthorized ways flies in the face of what open source stands for, where such uses of the code are meant to be encouraged....