Some businesses that use Google Maps API to help customers find them can say farewell to the free service. Google recently made a change to its Google Maps API terms of service. Starting next year,  Google will charge $4 per 1,000 map loads on websites and apps where traffic exceeds 25,000 map loads per day.

Google Maps API will remain free for sites that don’t exceed those limits. Web developers also have the option of buying a Premier licence for $10,000+ which includes unlimited map access, advanced geocoding tools, and tech support.

If you exceed the limits and haven’t set up a payment system or purchased a Premier license, your map will not be shut down. However, a “warning may be shown on your map and a Maps API Premier sales manager may contact you to discuss your licensing options,” according to the Google Maps FAQ.

Developers who don’t feel like forking over money for map service can use OpenStreetMap, which is similar to Google Maps and free.

The economy’s still in the dumps, and, as evidenced by the growing popularity of the Occupy Wall Street movement, there’s a growing resentment across the country toward “the haves” by the “have-nots.” People are taking out their frustrations on Wall Street, protesting the big earnings by some financial magnates while the average person struggles to meet his monthly financial obligations.

As has become evident in the past few weeks, there’s no shortage of “haves” in the CRM industry either. In just the past few weeks alone, we’ve seen billions of dollars change hands in some very lucrative acquisition deals. Going back to mid-September, here’s a sample of some of the more notable ones:

• Just today, Oracle, the world’s second largest software maker, announced its plans to buy RightNow Technologies for $1.5 billion, adding customer-service expertise and software as it looks to bolster its cloud-based offerings.

RightNow is Oracle’s ninth acquisition in just the past 12 months. The announcement comes less than a week after Oracle announced that it will buy Endeca Technologies, a provider of unstructured data management, Web commerce, and business intelligence solutions, for an undisclosed amount

According to published reports, Oracle has acquired more than 70 companies in a $40 billion shopping spree that dates back to 2005 when it bought PeopleSoft.

• Just two weeks after closing its deal to acquire VoIP and unified communications technology provider Sipera, Avaya on October 20 announced it has acquired Aurix, a global provider of speech analytics and audio data mining technology. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Aurix’s technologies, which include a phonetic audio search engine built on scalable, open architecture and enabling real-time and historical analysis of one-to-one or group spoken interactions, will be incorporated into Avaya’s contact center and unified communications portfolios.

• Alcatel-Lucent announced October 19 that it has received a binding offer of $1.5 billion from a company owned by private equity firm Permira for the acquisition of its Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories business. Genesys, which reported 2010 sales of approximately $500 million, is a recognized leader in customer service software and contact center solutions for enterprises.

• Noble Systems, a provider of unified contact center technology solutions, on October 14 acquired Australia-based Open Wave, a workforce management (WFM) software and solutions specialist, for an undisclosed amount.  The transaction includes all assets and intellectual property, including Open Wave’s ShiftTrack WFM solution.

• HP on October 3 acquired control of Autonomy in a stock deal. Autonomy’s software powers more than 25,000 customer accounts worldwide and, as part of HP, will provide high-value business solutions to help customers manage the explosion of unstructured and structured information. Autonomy offers solutions that are complementary across HP’s enterprise offerings and strengthens the company’s data analytics, cloud, industry, and workflow management capabilities.

• Verint Systems on September 26 announced plans to acquire Global Management Technologies (GMT), an Atlanta-based provider of workforce management (WFM) solutions to bank branches and other financial services customers. The deal is worth $24.6 million in cash at closing, and possibly another $17.4 million in cash based on future performances.

• NICE Systems on September 25 acquired Fizzback, a provider of voice-of-the-customer (VoC) applications, for approximately $80 million. By adding direct customer feedback with the Fizzback solution, NICE now enhances its customer experience management and workforce optimization solutions with an added holistic understanding of the customer by combining on one platform the VoC from each of the three feedback dimensions: direct, indirect, and inferred.

• Salesforce.com in late September announced its acquisition of Assistly, a provider of customer-service help desk technology built for the cloud, for approximately $50 million. For Salesforce.com, the acquisition further expands its reach into the small business space. Salesforce.com already has about 17,000 customers using its Service Cloud applications, and the deal gives it potentially millions more considering the number of small businesses in the country.

• TrustYou, a provider of social media monitoring and semantic technologies for the online reviews and social commerce space, on September 20 acquired Dallas-based competitor ReviewAnalyst in a move that will bring the total number of customers on the TrustYou platform to more than 6,000 globally.

• Market Force Information, a provider of customer intelligence solutions, is expanding into Europe with the acquisition of Retail Eyes, a customer experience and mystery shopping provider. The acquisition, which was announced September 19, enables Market Force to establish a European Center of Excellence and add more than 100 world-class clients to its portfolio. It also doubles the company’s independent contractor force from 300,000 to more than 600,000 mystery shoppers and retail auditors across the Americas and Europe.

• IP telephony provider 8×8 on September 16 completed its acquisition of Contactual, a developer of virtual call center solutions, in an all-stock transaction. The deal will enable a deeper level of integration between 8×8′s existing suite of services and Contactual’s remote customer service technology, which 8×8 has been reselling since 2007. The acquisition will also allow 8×8 to produce a light version of Contactual’s software that strips out some enterprise-level functionality for smaller customers.

Now I’m no financial analyst, but that seems like an awful lot of money to me, no matter how the rest of the country is doing.

Federated Media made an announcement yesterday that through its new partnership with WordPress.com’s developer, Automattic, the millions of people who use WordPress.com will soon have the ability to place ads on their blogs.

If you’re an advertiser on Federated Media’s network, this is very good news.

The partnership, which was announced during the Web 2.0 Summit event in San Francisco, means Federated Media’s advertisers will be able to target their ads by matching them with audiences from specific WordPress.com blogs.

Over 308 million people view more than 2.5 billion WordPress blog pages each month, according to WordPress.com.

WordPress.com blog owners currently have limited options when it comes to including ads on their blogs. Unless you own a VIP blog or have a lot of traffic (generally 25,000 pageviews per month or more) you are not allowed to include ads on your blogs or accept sponsored content.

It’s still unclear how Automattic and Federated Media will split the revenue with WordPress.com users, but this could potentially turn blogging on WordPress.com into a highly lucrative business.

Disclosure: DestinationCRM blog is powered by WordPress.com.

In case your manager hasn’t told you yet for fear that it might go to your head, this week, Oct. 3-9, is Customer Service Week.

The week is designed to recognize the importance of customer service and to honor the thousands of people who support and serve customers every day with the highest degree of care, courtesy, and professionalism. We know its not an easy job; it’s often a thankless and unrewarded profession that can easily try one’s nerves.

This week, stop and give special recognition to the people who make up the backbone of most companies, dealing directly with customers and providing quality service however, wherever, and whenever the customer needs it.

Customer service reps, whether they work in a three-man shop or a multinational corporation with thousands of employees, deserve our  recognition every week of the year, but this week is special. Let’s try to show them that we appreciate their efforts.