Google Finance targets free real-time data
There indeed appears to be a change in announcement tactics at Google’s main official blog.
In “Google search for super models” I discuss a new “provocative” style of headlining and positioning used by Google to make a product enhancement update.
The Google blog continues a “provocative” headline style today with a Google Finance product enhancement announcement that does not deliver a product enhancement.
Google titles its post “Real-time quotes for free” and begins by underscoring a commitment to its public-serving style “mission” (see “Is Google a public service?”):
At Google, we get excited about making all kinds of information accessible to everyone. The more up-to-date the information, the more valuable it is. This is particularly true in the world of finance; information, and timing of that information, is money. Today, real-time quotes are not freely and easily available on the web. Some websites offer one real-time quote at a time, but typically only after you have enrolled in a service and/or signed a complicated legal agreement. Other sites approach the problem differently and show you streaming delayed data, but that doesn't solve the problem either -- it masks it. What's really important is getting free, easy and fast access to real-time quotes so you know how the market or your company is doing now, not as of twenty minutes ago.
Google goes on to discuss how it has “worked” with the SEC and the NYSE to enable cost-efficient “real-time, last-sale prices across all Google properties.” The “work” it references reflects lobbying efforts of “our D.C. trade association, NetCoalition.”
The Associated Press:
The Washington-based lobbying group asked the SEC for a broad review of how U.S. stock exchanges charge for market data and suggested that other pending fee proposals be stayed pending final review.
The proposal "imposes fees that put access to the NYSEArca quotations beyond the reasonable economic reach of an advertiser-supported medium like the Internet," NetCoalition wrote in requesting the review.
While Google’s headline suggests a product enhancement availability, the post serves to promote its "work," or what it deems is NetCoalition's efforts to ensure that “financial data as we know it is about to change.”
“Real-time quotes for free” at Google? Not now, but Google promos:In the meantime, set up your portfolio on Google Finance today.