A website, wrapped in a transcoder, inside a browser

To me Google Notebook could have an immense impact across the mobile world (the link to the the post that set me off is below) – if Google realizes all the little pieces they have.

How?

Well, it’s part of some converging trends I (and others) see, and which I think are crucial for the efficient fusion of the Web and mobile.

Trend 1 is getting well established – Transcoders [some hat tips to Russ B and Christian L].
I would love all websites to automagically sense my phone and serve me pages that are layed out and massaged (via CSS) to fit and act properly on my phone. Eh, so maybe the larger sites and some specialty sites will do that. But, what about the bazillion other sites?

Transcoders.

Google has a transcoder. You can either use it directly by typing in the URL to be transcoded, or you get transcoded pages when using Google Mobile.

Trend 2 is growing in the PC world, but not really making an impact in the mobile world – Aggregators [some hat tips to Rich Mc].
I mentioned before that a new wave of aggregators are gaining steam in the PC world. The key thing aggregators (or personal home pages) do is that they allow you to clump together all the info streams you follow into a single UI.

Google Personal Mobile is a mobile version for Google Personal. Yet, it bewilders me that the mobile version is not as versatile as the main version. More on this later. In any case, I am hoping that this new crop of aggregators remember the size of the mobile world.

Trend 3 is still small, small like 1995 – Template-driven mobile site creators.
I’ve spoken about WINKsite enough here. WINKsite has a menu-drive method that makes it really easy for you to whip up a mobile site that actually is useful.

On the other end of the scale, Google Pages totally missed this and seems to me as a Geocities (1995) clone. Where’s the mobile?

Part way back on that scale, I think TypePad is a great and versatile system for creating websites, albeit blog-like ones. Nonetheless, with a few well made templates (which they are good at making), most of their blogs could be made mobile-savvy.

Now, here’s where I think all this can be tied in:
The transcoder is a great way to access info on the Web without having to worry so much  about what will show up. It partially understands which pages are already formatted for mobiles. Also, it displays the transcoded page wrapped within a menu system that enables some simple actions (for example, ‘back to results’ or ‘hide images’).

What’s needed is to expand that notion of wrapping pages in a menu system.

Envision this:
I go to the mobile Google Search page. I search for ‘cats’ and then get a list of pages found. When I click on a link (which is in Google proxy gobbledygook), the Google transcoder is so kind to show me a proper mobile page, transcoded or not. Then, and this you cannot do in anyone’s system, if I want to throw it into Google Notepad, there’s a link in the menu below letting me do that.

Now take it further:
I have my own personal page. It has all my feeds, all my info streams. I can read this page from the mobile too. If I see something I want to follow, I can, without worrying about how it will show up on my phone (it’s that clever transcoder). Then, I might want to blog about something I’m reading – there’s a menu item below to let me do that. Or, if I want to send it to my online bookmark sharing service, there’s a link for that too.

Basically, by aggregating the pieces into a unified navigation experience through a central personal portal, sending any information through a clever transcoder, and wrapping it inside a menu system, we can start to return the functionality we leave at our desks.

If you notice, you have a browser, you’ve added buttons and right-click features to it to help you (using me as an example) make a TypePad QuickPost, tag and send the URL to del.icio.us, capture the RSS feed for Bloglines, or upload something to your site or Flickr.

In my limited mind, the only way I see for me to get that full connectivity to all my services and info flow is through a central portal that holds all the pieces, understanding what I want to do with all those nuggets of info. Google has many of those pieces and all they need to do is tie it together (it’s those converging trends).

Of course, for me, I would like to have a system that wouldn’t force me to use Google stuff, I already have my own stuff. Therefore, I think someone outside Google or Yahoo might have a better chance at creating something like this, without having brand conflicts.

It’s not hard (technically) to tie all those pieces together (usability is another story). I know a few people who could do it, too. Privately, I’ve been trying to convince folks that this is the way to go – a way to provide a rich mobile Internet experience. Here, I release the thought into the wild.

What do you think? Did I miss something? Are you working on something similar? I wanna know.

Link: TechCrunch � Blog Archive � Google Notebook Launches: Ho-Hum.

You no longer need to see the pre-release screenshots: Google Notebook is now live at google.com/notebook.

As I mentioned in my previous post, Google Notebook is a direct Del.icio.us competitor. You can bookmark content (a web page or a piece of content on a web page) either via normal Google search (click on the “note this” link at the bottom of a search result), or on the open web with an IE or Firefox extension (highlight text, right click).

Regarding the title: OK, so I didn’t cleverly twist that Churchill quote. 😛