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The move by Google is sure to leave Apple and Microsoft shaking in their boots, and quite frankly, I’m certain this is the beginning of the end for Ubuntu & co. What I’d like to focus on here however is Apple, a company which just weeks ago I couldn’t see myself ever abandoning, and who had convinced me that beauty, elegance and reliability were my top priorities when it came to an operating system.

Since the increasing development and improvement of Google Apps (and web apps as a whole), the increased speed of Chrome, the release of Android and now, the Google OS. I’m left torn. Nearly everything I currently do is online, and I’d say approximately 80% involves Google Apps. I realise, your average non-geek Joe is a long long way from this, but I’ve never been more convinced that in time – everyone will use the web, an online word processor/spreadsheet etc.. (probably Google Docs) to work just as many have used windows and office for so long.

Commitment to Google Apps

My current commitment to Google Apps (until something better comes along of course) has left me frequently day-dreaming. Entertaining ideas of what it would be like to truly incorporate all my primary web services into an operating system designed to really make sure they work as best as they possibly can. An operating system so reliable, smooth, fast and secure that using the web would feel local.

My day-dreams came true today, and it means I’m left wondering what Apple can bring to the table between now and Google’s OS release, aside from a gorgeous UI and decent hardware that will pumped about Apple again. After two years with the iPhone I’m already considering abandoning the device for an Android phone, primarily because of its integration with Google’s applications. Android has a local Gmail client, maps is fully featured, everything is pushed, email, contacts and calendar events…its all slick and its all built in.

The point is this…

As long as Google and web applications continue to improve at the rate they are, Apple is the only company I can see with potential to retain its current user base, but to do it, they’re going to have to start thinking far more Google-like. Apple’s propriety strategy, I believe, is an advantage, but Google’s offerings are increasingly more attractive a proposition and unless Apple rethink their local OS strategy (as I’m sure they will by the way), this is the beginning of an era of Google dominance, the likes of which we’ve never seen before.

The company is slowly but surely taking over every aspect of our lives from email (a backbone to nearly all our lives), to how we work, video and photosharing, how we maintain voice communication, the operating system our phone runs on…for some its scary, for me… I’m excited. And for now at least, the one company I want to see step up to Google’s surge in dominance is Apple, and I predict they will, but its not going to be easy.

Although, I am writing Microsoft’s long term consumer market off now, and saying loud and clear that the future is Google vs. Apple. Robert Scoble has just posted on Friendfeed: “Why did Google announce Chrome OS this week? Well, of course, Microsoft has a big announcement coming on Monday (I’m embargoed).” So you never know, I could of course be very very wrong and Microsoft might just have a few tricks up its sleeve, one might work..I doubt it.

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But here’s a wacky thought: Maybe Microsoft is just collateral damage in this war. Maybe the real competitor to Google is Apple! Launching its Chrome OS in the second half of 2010 may be simply a bid by Google to keep the Web a viable, robust place — even as users (especially Apple users) are starting to be enticed away from it.(See Google Earth’s historical photos.)

Google’s interests are perfectly aligned with a free and open Web. That’s its brilliance. Google dominates the Web platform. The more you use the Web, the more likely you are to use its hugely popular search products, and the more ads Google will sell, targeted at you. It doesn’t really matter which browser you use to get there — Internet Explorer, Firefox or Google’s house browser, Chrome — as long as you use Google Search, Maps and any of the other suite of fine, free Google products.

The first real threat Google faced was Facebook. That’s because when people are on the popular social network, they aren’t using Google Search. Even worse, instead of asking Google Search where they should eat tonight, they’re asking their Facebook friends. And the more of their personal stuff (pictures, videos and so on) they put behind Facebook’s closed doors, the worse it is for Google, which also owns YouTube. That’s why Google has attempted (so far, with limited success) to get into the social-network business.(See the 50 best websites of 2008.)

But the Facebook threat pales beside the remarkable success of Apple’s iPhone and the rise of a mobile computing platform that exists parallel to — but distinctly apart from — the Google-dominated Web. While it’s true that the iPhone accounts for more Web browsing than any other smartphone, it’s also true that browsing the Web on it is still a suboptimal experience. Anyone who uses an iPhone knows that native apps are infinitely better to use than the Web. The iPhone is all about apps — not browsing the Web. Virtually any site you can think of, from the New York Times to theHuffington Post, is exponentially better when viewed via a dedicated iPhone app than it is when visited via the iPhone’s browser.(See the top iPhone applications.)

So we can assume that as apps get better and better, iPhone-driven Web use on those all-important content sites will taper off.

But you ain’t seen nothing yet. Apple is expected to unveil its own table computer (think of an iPod Touch on steroids) by the end of the year. While a larger-screen device cannot run the 50,000-plus iPhone applications without some modification, we can assume that Apple’s engineers have a fix in the works. So when it arrives, it’ll be a game changer, complete with a library of software that provides 50,000-plus reasons not to go on the Web. The biggest part of the game it will change will be to dilute the Google-dominated Web.

That’s why it really makes sense for Google to come out with a free operating system. Google needs to keep the Web humming, and what better way than to ensure that there are plenty of supercheap Web tablets out there? It must be odd these days to be Eric Schmidt. Not only is he Google’s CEO, but he’s a board member of Apple.

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There are roughly a million officially recognized words in the English language, but these 20 crop up everywhere when it comes to naming video games. Is it due to a lack of originality or just a set of universal themes? Flip open your dictionaries and join us for a definitive look at the most overused words in game names.

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