I just don't get it. Why is this needed?
But I have no doubt there is a play happening here.
Probably it will change over time to make gathering data easier?
Or something else that makes Google money.
Try to use some critical thinking here before immediately jumping into conspiracy theories. Maybe start with reading the actual post rather than just seeing Google and geolocation in the same sentence and forming your opinion based on that.
google.com/maps to capture your location across the whole domain easier than before