Google has good reason to cater to the iPhone and that reason is as simple as this — iPhone users use the Internet on their phone, and they go to Google! So for Google, it makes sense that they’d want to provide an excellent experience to those who use them most. The New York Times recently reported how around Christmas, traffic to Google from iPhone users rose sharply. It was enough of a climb that iPhone traffic surpassed traffic to Google from other mobile devices like those running the Symbian operating system, Windows Mobile, or even BlackBerry devices. With such a small percentage of the market using the iPhone but a large portion (in comparison to other mobile phones) of them using the Internet, companies like Google are paying attention.
So what is it about the iPhone that makes their users want to go browse the Internet? That answer is simple — browsing the web on an iPhone has never been so easy on the iPhone. One analyst in particular says it best when he said that “The iPhone has taken the frustration out of browsing on a mobile phone.” It’s not just Google that has seen a surge either, other sites like Yahoo have as well which means that multiple companies will be focusing their efforts on creating the best possible mobile experience for iPhone users.
When I said that Google caters to iPhone users, I meant it. They’re at Macworld this week where they announced several improvements to the “integrated Google experience on the iPhone.” Improvements that they announced today include:
- Improved UI – Google apps are improved for iPhone users
- Customization of default tabs – users can customize what appears at the top of the Google.com menu bar
- Faster Gmail
- Faster Calendar
- iGoogle – iPhone users can access their iGoogle gadgets on their phone (although the Gmail Chat gadget doesn’t work, bummer!)
If you own an iPhone, just go to www.google.com and it will recognize that you’re using the iPhone Safari browser and then you can experience all of the great improvements. Note: There’s no word on how Google is rolling the changes out. Not everybody will have it right away.
Well is google expecting apple to return the compliment come the gphone( wonder when that will be) and in what way i guess
Ya Google really wants to be friendly with apple and I think it’s worked out fine. I thought the gphone would end that, but that seems not to be the case.
Another cool ap made with IUI : [Flickr2iPhone.com] – Flickr2iPhone.com allows you to export your flickr.com sets to your iPhone ! These sets will be available at [iphone.flickr2iphone.com] .. When you update them on Flickr they are automatically updated on Flickr2iPhone ! It’s easy and FREE !
I’m guessing that Google just wants to make sure it’s their services that are integrated on the devices, and not the others. Google Maps is currently being used on the iPhone, and Google probably wants to make sure it stays that way. Not to mention that Google’s Android OS is expected to work great with sites made for the iPhone.
@Ashley:
We have to bear in mind that Google is represented in Apple’s Board of Directors. That gives them a great advantage in offering their services to Apple.
Regards,
Omar.-
[comment]So what is it about the iPhone that makes their users want to go browse the Internet? [/comment]
Just another reason: accessing Internet on iPhone doesn’t add extra fees
Very true. I guess that’s reason enough for Google to cater to the iPhone.
“browsing the web on an iPhone has never been so easy on the iPhone.”
Well DUH. Browsing the web on an iphone is patently impossible on an N97..