Google Tops the Charts

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You can't click on the names of the businesses, for example, to find out details such as hours of operation, a link to the company's Web site, or reviews submitted by other users. Google offers a lot of this info.

Yahoo's new beta serves up even more information. But getting there requires an extra step. With Google and Mapquest, you need only type in a piece of geographic info and a keyword -- such as "sushi Palo Alto" -- and you're off to the races. With Yahoo's beta product, however, first you need to type in the location you wish to search ("Palo Alto") and then wait for the map to load. Then you type in "sushi." The lack of a single search box is both confusing and annoying. It took me several queries before I realized that I couldn't type "San Mateo coffee" when the map presently shows San Francisco.

Although Google may have a lead on the capabilities of its competitors, it still has plenty of flaws to sort through. One biggie is the sheer size of its maps. Google's maps measure roughly 8.5 inches by 5.5 inches, nearly double the size of those served up by competitors such as Rand McNally or Mapquest. Over a dial-up connection, these hulking graphics become unwieldy. Simply calling up a satellite map of San Francisco, for instance, took over two minutes from my dial-up connection at home.

TOO-WIDE ANGLE.

Even when the graphics finish loading, the end result isn't always impressive. Sometimes, the default zoom of Google maps can be far too broad. Take, for instance, my recent search for a sushi restaurant in Palo Alto. I typed "sushi Palo Alto" into Google Maps and got a sprawling map that went from Morgan Hill to San Francisco -- a span of 70 miles. Sure, all the right restaurants were flagged in the middle of the map, but 80% of the map was useless, and I couldn't make out the main thoroughfares at that distance. A similar search on Mapquest returned an easy-to-digest map that spanned just a few miles.

Sure, it only takes one click on the zoom button to get Google's map at the right level of focus. But the prospect of reloading yet another hefty image was a bit daunting -- unless I could justify it with a two-minute bathroom break.

Google could certainly benefit from continued design work, rethinking both the speed of its pages and the scope of its images. Less is often more for people hunting for the right information fast. But the sheer innovation of its mapping features set Google at the front of the pack. Moreover, it gives Google hope that it can innovate well beyond its stronghold of Web search.

Elgin is a correspondent in BusinessWeek's Silicon Valley bureau .