bakedjake - 5:16 pm on Nov 30, 2005 (gmt 0)

Is this something that is going on behind the scenes, but is not really implemented on the site?

Yeah, we have a lot more data than what's implemented on the site. That'll change very soon.

it seems that taking a dataset that I work very hard on and selling it to someone who basically wants to compete with me is not a very good business plan.

And you'd be right. My question was attempting to make a point: There are better datasources out there from companies not willing to sell. Unfortunately, those sources don't have the publicity resources of the major players.

But, when you consider you business plan, you have to ask yourself if you think a major player will eventually catch up to you. Which you seem to be thinking about already:

How do the national sites plan on improving their data to the point it is useful to the end user and how do you make any money at it?

Refine the data mining operations, partner deals, etc. You make money by selling it.

The local data industry is very incestuous.

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One thing we don't talk about is margin for error. Data in the local space runs between 80-90% accuracy when it is produced. But many players don't update often enough. Data in the local space erodes extremely quickly - we see about a 33% change rate in the basefile every 6 months. That's a lot of businesses opening and closing!

Often, in the rush for new features, we (as an industry) forget about data. But, as this thread shows, it's vitally important.