Add some gadgets to your website says Google

Stan Beer
Wednesday, 04 October 2006 16:58

Your IT - Home IT

Website publishers looking for content to make their sites a cooler and more interesting destination to visit can now add Google Gadgets for free to their sites.

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Gadgets are mini applications, sometimes called applets, that can perform tasks or provide information simply by clicking on an icon. Google has a choice of 1220 gadgets, including applications such as calendars, clocks, horoscopes, pacman style games, Google Maps, Google Calendar, jokes, quotes, weather reports, calculators and the list goes on.

Perviously, Google, like Yahoo and Microsoft, who also have ranges of similar applets, made its gadgets available only for the desktop or customised Google pages of users. Now the search leader has made its gadgets available for web publishers. Google calls its range of gadgets for other websites Universal Gadgets.

Google's strategy is to spread its brand throughout the web rather than make users come to the Google site.

By making its gadgets freely available to other web publishers, Google has set itself apart from desktop stalwarts Microsoft and Apple, who want users to download gadgets to their desktops. Web content leader Yahoo has more than 3200 gadgets (called widgets) but wants users to add them to their customised Yahoo pages.

According to some analysts, Google is intent on creating an environment where the web is a platform that replaces the desktop. The search company, like other web services providers, has already started working with commercial web publishers, such as real estate lookup sites that have integrated Google Maps into property searches.