Come on, Google. You can do it—the ePub e-book standard, I mean.
Google has just launched a new browser, which could, as seen by the Wall Street Journal, be an operating system in disguise. That suggests lots of potential beyond mere Web browsing. E-books and ePub, anyone?
We already know about Opera being able to read ePub experimentally via a widget. Might Google have similar plans for the Chrome browser, now in beta and downloadable later today for free in a Windows incarnation?
Looking farther, ahead, the Google browser might fit in well with ambitions in networked book area.
Remember, via caching systems similar to the one used in Gears, people in time would be able to enjoy even some networked books off line—or at least the more common links. Just depends on how quickly hardware and bandwidth improve. At any rate you can’t think of possible scenarios for Chrome without also remembering the existence of services such as Google Book Search.
The big selling points: Speed and stability—even multithreading capabilities. Oh, how the suspense mounts. With better user control, will the browser be less of a memory hog than Firefox, which, alas, in its very latest incarnation, still acts up on me?
A question at jkOnTheRun: How well will the new browers run on notebooks. Here at the TeleBlog, we’ll pop another question. What about incarnations for cellphones and other handhelds? And how might Chrome fit in with the Google-backed Android OS? Obviously Microsoft, which wants to use Internet Explorer 8 to steer people to its search engines, has stirred Google’s competitive instincts. See image to the left.
The Amazon angle: What if Google can learn to do interactivity at the same level that Amazon does? The multi-threaded brower could open up a number of possibilities in the e-book area and elsewhere. The big issue is, whether Google can.
Related: Info on the comic book promoting Chrome, plus our earlier item, ePub widget for Opera: Browsers to do e-books in a big way?
And a reminder: As a retirement investment, I own a tiny speck of Google, which, as TeleBlog regulars know, I don’t hesitate to bash when it deserves it.
I’ve been using Chrome for about two hours or so now, throwing EVERYTHING at it — and it’s just incredible. I can have DOUBLE the number of Tabs than I could in Fox 2 (I couldn’t even use Fox 3 without wanting to die from the slowness!). Everything is so freakin FAST, it’s like I have a nearly up-to-date PC!
Now if I could just get all those Fox plug-ins I need for the Net. First one being Twitterfox (I am Tiwtter-addicted!).