Google Goggles coming to iPhone, pending app store approval

The search giant, Google, has just announced it would bring its visual search application Google Goggles to Apple’s iOS platform, making the application available for iPhone and iPad users.

Google Goggles is already available for Google Android powered mobile devices through the Android Marketplace.

Google Goggles retrieves useful information from a picture a user snaps along with their respective GPS position.

The company is dubbing the product a universal visual search tool.

However, although the app works great on certain queries, it is still in beta, but the company says future updates will make the product more effective and useful with more accurate and relevant information.

 Currently, the app works on a few main things, such as books, business cards, artwork and landmarks.

Taking a photo of a book will take a user to Google’s online book service, Google Books, where the user could actually read the entire book online, assuming it is offered on Google Books.

Snapping a photo of a landmark displays historical information about the site, and so on.

Where the app really becomes useful is primarily for travelers, who could snap photos of restaurants to get reviews and other information about the place.

Google says the application also has facial recognition capabilities, but has opted not to include the feature, at least for now, due to privacy concerns.

Google even says that in a future release, the app could even suggest the next-move during a real chess game.

The company says the current version of Google Goggles is in the process of getting approved by Apple, in order to have the app published in Apple’s App Store.

It is not likely the iOS version of Google Goggles would have embedded AdSense ads given Apple would more than likely reject the app due to its anti-compete policy with its own iAds platform.

Tech giants across the industry have raised anti-trust concerns over Apple’s anti-compete policy, especially how Internet traffic is really gearing towards mobile devices, and given Apple’s increasing mobile marketing share, Apple’s closed policy could pose a systemic risk to traditional online ad networks, including that of Google AdSense.

A timeframe has not been released as to when Google Goggles could hit the app store, but it should likely be approved within the next couple of weeks.