Google sets up Heathrow boredom killer

Google Space internet booth set up at Terminal One

Google has opened an internet booth at London's Heathrow Airport in a bid to learn more about how people use its services.

The 'pod' known as Google Space is situated in the Terminal One departure lounge and consists of 10 Samsung laptops dedicated to Google services. 

Google staff "flown in from all over the world" are on hand to answer any questions as well as monitor usage.

"We see it as a huge focus group," said Lorraine Twohill, Google's European director of marketing. "For many of our users, we have always been something in their computers and they have never actually met us."

A survey conducted for the launch by Google has shown that the average airline passenger wastes a day's holiday a year waiting around in airports, some nine hours in total.

Chief among passengers' interests if they had internet access is to find out more about their destination (71 per cent), while a quarter wanted to fire off last minute emails and a fifth wanted to pay bills.

Google Space will be open from 0700 to 1900 until 19 December. The search firm's products being demonstrated include Google Mail, Google Earth, Google Local, Google Toolbar, Picasa and Google Mobile.

Google will extend the idea to other sites if it proves to be a success.