Google's autolink is basically described in Google's
post-install screen as: turning "street addresses into links to online maps." So if I put an address into one of my pages when a visitor visits my page with the toolbar installed, it will display a "look for map" link.
A link automatically generated by the toolbar. If the visitor clicks on the link they will see a popup window similar to this example.
After a user has clicked on the link a NEW link appears on my page. The link looks exactly like other links with my address.
It appears as if the author of the page added the link. The webmaster at this point has no control over this. This is basically adware at its best. Although this feature may be useful many site owners may not want this service on their sites.
If you have a guestbook (do people still have these?), blog, forum or other sites that enable user's to enter data that has many address listings on pages wouldn't this slow down the page's load time? I would assume, yes.
Overall this may just be good news for Microsoft. They will probably have a legitimate argument that if Google can do this why can't they use their "smart tag"? Some will say (Rivux) that Microsoft is different because they have a monopoly in the OS and Web browsers, blah blah blah.
This will just pretty much open the flood gates to who knows what. First it's street address' what's next?
imaginemn