I got a little surprise when going to Google.com this morning:
The legendary simplicity of Google's home page has been replaced by a mashup that you can easily configure. You can get the old home page back by clicking on "Classic Home". Google.fr still sports the simple search home page.
Netvibes (and al.) got a new competitor, just one of the 800-pound gorilla type. It's going to be hard for them because Google is going to provide more and more services besides search, news and other content feeds, and make it transparent and simple. One example is GMail, it took me just one click to add the GMail gadget, while on other mashups I would have to provide my login/password information. Another is Google Calendar, and you can bet that Google Documents, their online office suite, will find its way in there. Google will also provide this to entreprises, packaged in an appliance for use on their intranet. We'll be quickly moving from information-centric mashups to personal dashboards.
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Wow, they're becoming Yahoo!
It's the portal wars of the 90's all over again!
This must be one of the signs of the End Times.
Seriously, though, it didn't display this for me when I went to Google. It must be a test thing.
I think you need to have the famous Google cookie and a Google account (such as GMail, Google Analytics, Google Calendar, etc.) so it identifies you. And it might just be a test, yes, but I bet it'll stick.
It's been around for at least an year in the US. People call it the IG, because it's at google.com/ig
@Alek: first time I see it when going straight to google.com home page.
It's new on Google home page but it actually exists for more than one year. I used it before Netvibes launched but since I switched back to the usual Google home page. It's back since today.
You can also add Picasa Web Album to share and show photos.
Rien de nouveau !
Cette fonction est apparue sur Google France il y a de nombreux mois, au moins pour ceux qui ont un compte Google.
URL directe du mashup : http://www.google.fr/ig?hl=fr
Pour ma part, après avoir joué quelques jours avec, j'en suis revenu au Google "de base" qu'on connaît depuis toujours et qu'on aime pour sa simplicité.
Mais en effet c'est frontalement concurrent à Netvibes avec toute la puissance de Google derrière.
Vous pensez que les VCs qui ont investi dans Netvibes ne connaissaient pas ?
@Pierre Col : first time it shows up for me on the NORMAL home URL, i.e. I was not using /ig?... The day before I had the "classic" home, and I didn't chose the so-called "IG" home, but it showed up anyway. As for Netvibes VCs, I do hope they knew.
What, no Google Reader in there? *goes to fetch glasses*
Found it. I'm loving this.