From that article: "This is actually a product that Google’s been testing in various formats for some time. Steve Poland (a regular contributor here) is pointing me to some posts (and here) by Greg Sterling from last year that discuss this. The earliest reports on this are from October 2006, and the service may be from an acquisition of 1-877-520-FIND. More information here." Again though.. Pure speculation.. It's not implausible because big companies do keep tabs on their competition. Also not sure if Microsoft's history with their product goes back even further.