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Earthcomber updated the Palm platform edition of its eponymous personal navigation application today. It now supports turn-by-turn directions for wirelessly connected devices, such as smartphones (specifically the Treo 600 and 650), or PDAs with Wi-Fi.

Earthcomber combines free maps with data to help travelers find what they're looking for: be it a hot spot, coffee store, ATM, office supplies, fast-food, banks, restaurant, car rental, historic sites, museums, schools, public buildings, parks, convenience stores, pharmacies, cleaners, fuel, eye-care, a pet store, etc.

Founder and president Jim Brady explained to PDAStreet that although Earhcomber began on the Palm OS several years ago, that platform had fallen behind Windows Mobile (and the Treo 700w), which this upgrade corrects. "We wanted to catch Palm up to that, so we've added turn-by-turn to our Palm platform product. In the meantime, we've really pumped it up," he said.

Earthcomber says its service "combs" any area for all items of interest to the traveler within a few seconds, unlike web-based mobile look-up services that take much longer and require input item-by-item.

And, unlike other services, which spend a lot of time aggregating data about locations - passing around the same old list of restaurants, for example - Earthcomber goes directly to the horse's mouth; so if the application says a point of interest is there, it is, according to Brady.

Some of the best authorities, Brady asserts, are national franchises. "They have their store locators; most of the time they maintain them within a couple of months of currency. There might be one or two that are not on the map yet. But they are a generally on there," he said to PDAStreet.

Because Earthcomber started long before the high prevalence of wireless and cellular devices, it has maintained that legacy capability to enable users to leverage its navigation and location-based data with or without a wireless enabled.

Brady said, "In the beginning, the concept was someday wireless will be quite prevalent, but right now, there are a lot of PDAs out there, so it would be handy if you could download this one big informational snapshot of where you're going and using the GPS (location-based sensing) and the profile of the things that you care about - a personalized customized list that you scan all at once the area all around you."

Now that there is wireless, you can get the turn-by-turn live directions, for example. With GPS but no wireless, you get the regular Earthcomber service, which will tell you where points of interests (over 1.5 million in all) are automatically; and without either wireless or GPS, the points of interests are still there, but you have to tell Earthcomber exactly where you are on the map.

Earthcomber plans to take additional advantage of live wireless connections by adding more capabilities to the informational layer where the points of interests lay at a later date.

Future location-based services will make today's look static. Where today, for example, a restaurant listing maybe hasn't been checked out and updated in the last two years, tomorrow, a user's smartphone may reflect changes made to a restaurant listing in the last 24 hours. So, say I'm running my own pizza place, I'll be able to alter my 'Daily Specials' description, for example, and that'll then appear live to an end user of a location based service. It's one big happy wirelessly connected world.

Generally, Earthcomber is a free service. "You can pick any city or county in the U.S. you want to and you still get the whole information layer," along with the maps, of course, its founder told us. They are "really trying to build a platform that distributes well to get all the commercial information on, so it works for people's many varied interests," he added.

Earthcomber also partners with name-brand travel, shopping and lifestyle guides, called Spot Guides, that plug into the service, but cost $8 to $20 each. These include various Mobile Travel Guides, the Where to Wear and Moon Metro series, Damron USA, and Find A Grave USA.

Revenue
When we asked how Earthcomber earned money, Brady said the company was coming into its own revenue-wise through advertising; but with no banner adds or pop ups. He called it a service or transaction ad model; by getting national brands to opt in.

For example, when a person signs up, they see a list of nationally known restaurants that they can add to their list. Outback Steak Houses, for example. The user can choose to check it off as one of their favorite things.

Brady acted out the part of a traveler, "I do a lot of driving. I don't know where they all are. It's not like McDonalds, where I can count on one every 20 miles or less. But, hey, if there's an Outback, and if I'm just kind of killing miles on an otherwise boring road; if I know its coming up, I'll drive the extra five or 10 miles to go there."

"When they checked that off as one of their favorite things, to the proprietors of Outback, for this listing, were getting a smartphone-owning person - who fits a nice demographic - who is alerted at their pleasure to any one of their places wherever they are, whenever they are traveling," he added.

Whatever range they set Earthcomber to, say you set it within five miles; it'll popup and tell the user an Outback is within that distance. The user is already sold on the brand. They're simply tapping people on the shoulder, letting them know where it is. It's unobtrusive.

Obtrusiveness is a danger with any advertising medium, but especially true for mobile, where people seem less willing to put up with it, unless they are getting something in return; pointed towards a favorite restaurant in Earthcomber’s case, or free ringtone maybe. It’s a nascent part of a fledgling content industry. We'll see vendors and marketers throw a lot different advertising methods at the wall before any become standard fare.

Brady painted his company's vision this way: "We are saying personal navigation needs to take a really strong break just from mapping and routing." The emphasis should be on personal. "That it finds the things that fit your world around you."