MobileSafari

The iPhone is about to get a new web browser. That is, if Apple approves Opera Mini for distribution in the App Store. Opera Software ASA has announced that an iPhone version of its efficient web browser will be submitted for approval very soon.

The project is said to be only weeks away from completion, and would bring Opera Mini to yet another mobile platform. The company has already released its software for Android, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile devices. In January, Opera Mini surpassed 50 million unique monthly users.

All eyes are on the relationship between Apple and Google as the companies continue to encroach on each other's territory. Now Business Week reports that negotiations between Microsoft and Apple have been taking place for weeks. The subject of the conversation: replacing Google with Bing as the default search engine on the iPhone.

This development comes as Google pioneers its own phones and the Android mobile OS to compete with Apple's iPhone. For its part, Apple is working behind the scenes to develop its own mapping and mobile advertising business.

The mobile version of Microsoft's Bing search engine has been revamped and now supports touch screen devices such as the iPhone. The touch-optimized interface (m.bing.com) is currently only available to users in the US.

Mobile phones that don't support the touch interface are forwarded to a simpler version of the site. Microsoft has also added additional features to the mobile search engine including a visual search movie finder and a real-time data search. Examples of real-time information available include airline flight delays and NFL scores and stats.

According to AdMob, the latest stats put iPhone OS web requests at 51 percent of all smartphone web traffic. The nearest competitor is RIM OS (Blackberry) with 19 percent of smartphone web traffic, while Microsoft Windows Mobile made third place with 14 percent.

Apple devices, including the iPod Touch, represent over 18 percent of total global web ad traffic. The only company with more traffic is Nokia, clocking over 30 percent in the same category. Worldwide requests from Apple devices increased 28 percent from December to January, hitting a total of 1.2 billion.

It's official. Google Book Search has gone mobile! This means your iPhone just became a library overnight. There are over 1.5 million books available for reading while connected to cellular data or Wi-Fi networks in the US. Due to copyright restrictions only about one third of these titles are available outside the US.

The mobile version of Google Book Search has all of the classics of literature that have been available through the main site, however texts have been optimized for swift downloading and ease of use. Using optical character recognition (OCR) software, Google has converted the works into plain text.