Google Optimizes Web Portal Just for the iPhone
Google has just become the latest Web site to create an iPhone-specific portal.
So the next time you try to go to Google.com from an iPhone, instead of the standard Google desktop portal, which you had been getting, you'll be directed to a new iPhone-specific Google user interface.
This iPhone-optimized Web page is, interestingly, quite different than the one Google delivers to other types smartphones. ItÿÏÍs got that iPhone look and feel. As you can see from the pictures in this article, the Google iPhone portal sports a user interface quite similar to other iPhone-optimized Web sites and applications.
In addition to the good old Google search box, the Google iPhone site offers direct access to Gmail, Calendar, Reader and More. When you click on this last link, the portal leads you to direct access to some additional Google services, including Docs, SMS, GOOG-411, News, Photos, Blogger and Notebook.
Google recommends you bookmark this page (see below) separately from the main iPhone Google page so you can gain faster access to these services.
So why are Google and others creating these iPhone-specific portals?
Although the iPhone's Safari browser delivers one of the best Internet experiences of any mobile browser, it is still far from perfect. It's not quite, as Steve Jobs has asserted, the real Web.
As a result, a lot of Web sitesÿÏÍlike Amazon.com and now Google, for exampleÿÏÍhave created more streamlined, iPhone-friendly portals. Heck, even Apple, with its excellent HTML-based Wi-Fi iTunes application, decided to streamline things and not deliver the full iTunes desktop experience to iPhone users.
Also, the iPhone is one of (if not the) fastest selling smartphones in history. Apple thinks it can sell 10 million next year alone, for instance, and has exceeded sales its sales goals for this year already. With the iPhone starting to roll out in markets outside the U.S., its popularity can only increase.
Consequently, for Web sites, providing fast and easy access to applications and services to the iPhone is becoming increasingly important to doing business. Best to make sure you give the ever growing number of iPhone users the best access you can to your online services and, it would seem, make that experience as close as possible to what users are already familiar with, the iPhone user interface.
As for me, whenever I head over to Amazon.com on the iPhone, I ignore the iPhone-specific interface and head over to the standard Amazon.com Web site.
(c) J.A.Miller
