The Ask.com announcement, The New Shape of Local Search has been widely reported.

However, not many commentators have noted how cool and useful this feature really is. OK so you can draw on the map, big deal I said to myself.

Then I started drawing. When I noticed the email and permalink I thought, how long is the image stored? Can my doodles be shared?

It appears that the drawing data is captured in the link (and not stored anywhere) and when the link is shared the map doodles go right along with it to redraw the custom map for the next viewer.

Here is a sample map with my input: http://city.ask.com/city?msid=f29535c07bc94e24c4c10fd0b697730c&msuserid=eeef09e483dbd0f315991e723912e733

The fact that there is a permalink to this image and that it can be emailed means that each users custom map can exist forever for whatever purpose…a temporary rendezvous, a map for a website…and possibly many more.