Download Squad

ZDNet's Garett Rogers says he's discovered Google's secret-until-now replacement for Froogle. Back in September Google announced that it would roll out a new product search engine by the holiday season, but it has yet to materialize--or has it? Doing a little poking around, Rogers uncovered this site in the same area of Google's web site as Google Base. It's a product search engine that lets you refine your search in a variety of ways--type, brand, price--and lets you see the results in three formats: List, Grid, and Map. The List view looks a bit like a standard Google results page, Grid view looks a bit like Google Images, and Map view looks like Google Maps.

The site is clearly in beta, or maybe alpha, as its results are sometimes nonsensical. As Rogers points out, a search for "iPod" is next to useless if you want to buy one, as it turns up more MySpace and Friendster pages than actual stores. Interestingly, the site seems intended to do more than just product search: A search for "athletic" gives you options like Age, Gender, Marital Status, and Sign, a search for "ranch" gives you real estate-related options, and a search for "sedan" gives you car-shopping options.

So, is this the new Froogle? I'm not sure. It must be something--Google wouldn't give it a URL and make it publicly accessible if it wasn't part of a product that will eventually be launched. However, with results that are often confusing and occasionally useless, what's available today (and it may or may not be available tomorrow) clearly isn't a finished product.