Google goes mobile in the UK

Google Mobile, long available in the U.S., has now made many Google services available to British customers via mobile phones. Gmail, Google News and even the Google Personalized Homepage are now available to wireless subscribers in the UK using just their handsets: no computer needed. Google appears to want to own your cellphone screen time just like it does with your Internet search time -- and GOOG investors would be wise to pay attention to the Internet search's giant's moves in this area.

Google has taken the bold design step of trying to duplicate the experience (and presentation) of its online services like Gmail and News into the tiny, two-inch screen real estate that most wireless phones now have. After having checked out Google Mobile -- available by just visiting www.google.com on your phone's browser -- I think the company has it down pretty well. Google's infamous easy-to-use and uncluttered interface on a computer's web browser is pretty much the modus operandi it's taken with porting its web services to fit on a mobile phone screen.

With Google launching its mobile offerings in full force in Britain, what else is left? The hard markets, that's what. It's pretty easy to port English-language web-based services to a mobile platform (I guess, since Google sure makes it look easy), but porting its services to Chinese, French, Italian, and other languages may prove a tad harsher -- and who knows if Google is preparing to do this. But, with billions of wireless customers around the globe speaking languages other than English, perhaps the larger markets are truly ahead for Google Mobile.