Parents usually tell their children that they don't have a favorite or love one sibling over the other.  But sometimes it's hard to believe them, especially when they keep showing one child more attention than some of the others.  Officially, Google probably doesn't have a favorite "child" product, either.  But they sure have been showing Google Base a lot of attention lately.  I can almost hear some of the other Google "children" pouting now.

Yesterday Google Base got a face lift and some added new features from its loving parents.  The new look, pictured on the Google Base Blog, uses AJAX to present users with a grid of search results, complete with picture and title.  Moving your mouse over a square on the grid causes it to "pop out" and offer more details.  List view is still available as well and it's quite simple to switch back and forth between the two.

Another new addition to the Google Base feature set is the ability to rate and review search result items.  The rating system uses stars and is available by clicking the "Rate This" link.  Search results can also be narrowed by star rating.  If you feel like saying a few words about an item in the results there's now a place to leave a review or post comments, which is also available under the "Rate This" link.

On the flip-side of the Google Base coin, a new feature was added to the single item entry page last week as well.  The new feature offers suggestions for attributes to associate with your entry.  Attributes are words that describe what you're posting and they allow people to find your entries easily.  The suggestions appear along the right side of the page and can be added with a simple click of the mouse.

If you haven't started using Google Base yet, you're missing out.  It's an excellent companion to the standard Google search and, with the addition of ratings and reviews, appears to be going more mainstream (or so Google hopes).  Google Base could also be a great way to find out how your customers feel about your products.  Upload a few and see what kind of rating or reviews they get.

I mean… if Google is showing favoritism to Base there must be a reason.  Better to be ahead and already a user now than to wait until they do something even bigger with it.