The jury is out on this post, but representatives of Vodafone and Google sought me out during the Mobile Search & Discovery conference in London last week to set the record straight. Plans for mobile search have not been derailed and a launch is in the works, they say. At Vodafone’s end, executives are bullish on what Google brings to the table (no comment on rev share) and hinted to me that Google’s breadth will also boost the recommendation aspect of Vodafone’s search (improving content suggestions based on people-like-you-liked-this or items-like-what-you-like-are). Details of the link-up between search and recommendation are sketchy, but Vodafone has committed to an on-the-record interview here that delves into much more detail. Watch this space. David Thevenon, Google European Operations Program Manager, also denied the Vodafone partnership had hit a bump. To the contrary, he believes that Google’s strong brand will help operators push mobile search. After all, online users know intuitively what to do when they see a search box — and mobile search won’t cross the chasm until mobile users have the same knee-jerk reaction.
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