What comes to mind when you think of the Wild West? Gun totting outlaw gangs, cowboys, stern sheriffs, musky saloons, desperate land and gold rushes....

This all sounds like America of the 1800s which is the era in which TV shows like HBO's Deadwood are set.

Strange as it sounds, however, this world is not a million miles away from cyberspace. Online businesses are in a constant state of one-upmanship and bravado similar to rival cowboy outfits. The online world transcends international boundaries so legal issues can become very confused leading to an almost lawless environment where byte-tottin' gangs run wild looking for gold.

For instance, Steve Jobs' comments about Google and Adobe are the perfect example of an old style bar-room rant. I could imagine him in the Wild West with all his Apple cohorts heckling his Google and Adobe counterparts on the other side of the bar.

"You darn two-bit Google hoodlums!" or

"You lazy Adobe go-fo-nuthins!" he would probably say.

I guess he would also be jumping around with an iPad in one hand and a glass of the strongest whiskey possible in the other. Google's Brin, Page and Schmidt would be sitting in the corner of the bar grumbling to themselves in multi-coloured Stetson hats emblazoned with the words 'Don't be evil'.

Of course the weapons of the online era are not guns but hardware, web apps and online business models and there is much money (gold) to be made. Google is looking to bring some law and order with its evolving web apps and advertising models but recently stepped on rival turf with the announcement of the Nexus One phone.

This was treated as an act of disrespect by Apple and a challenge to Apple's successful iPhone. Apple wants to make it clear that it 'runs the town' as far hardware goes and when you split you will split Apple's way. However, there is now talk of a gPad to rival Apple's iPad and this will only cause more unrest in the town.

Apple have also been increasing unhappy with the Adobe outfit. In their eyes they seem to be just an unreliable bunch of layabouts that spend all day in the saloon drinking whisky.

Of course there is also the Microsoft outfit too and they have been there for a long time. They used to 'run the town' pretty much outright once. Unfortunately, the Google outfit appeared from over the hill just over ten years ago and since then they have been muscling in all the rackets in the town. From operating systems, email and office applications Microsoft found themselves losing ground and have precious gold taken away from them. They have not been happy but struck back at the very heart of the Google outfit with the Bing search engine.

Over the hill there is a new town being built and a new gold rush. Two big outfits have emerged namely Twitter and Facebook. They have started making a lot of noise in their saloons too but this is the subject for another online Wild West tale.

This all makes for some interesting outlaw rivalries and whatever happens the online gold rush is here to stay. Only time will tell who gets to be sheriff (if one appears) but in the meantime there will be plenty of interesting bar-room brawls to follow this year in the Wild West of cyberspace.

Google's search engine dominance is a subject that has been discussed before on this blog in October of last year where I questioned whether the Google search engine was on the way out.

It has only been a matter of weeks since Microsoft's launch of its new search engine Bing. The new service was aimed to win some of the search engine market share which Google has dominated for so long. Recent weeks have seen Bing claim up to 15% of the market and it continues to further challenge Google.

Microsoft's challenge has not been unanswered as Google announced today that it would be launching it's own operating system in a direct challenge to Microsoft's dominance of the operating system market. It is possible that Windows may become a thing of the past if Microsoft do not up it's game. Its continued success will hinge upon Windows 7 which is due to be released later this year. However, Microsoft has had great difficulty in previous years with a very lack-lustre reaction to Vista. Microsoft even agreed a deal with some PC companies to ship new PCs with the older OS Windows XP. Vista has been viewed for the most part been viewed as clunky, cumbersome with some significant security flaws.

With the wide variety of Google Applications and products such as Maps, Gmail, Street View and the upcoming Wave would people be happy using a Google OS to? For my part I like to have a bit of variety in my life and would not like all of my IT tasks to be reliant on one company. On the other hand, Microsoft’s offerings have not been anywhere close and even the enthusiasm of Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer could not win me round. It is a real pain for people to keep having to learn how to use new systems and people favour what they are familiar with. This is the reason for people's and business' reliance on Microsoft. However, just because something is familiar does not mean it is the best product out there. Many people also go for an open source linux based operating system such as Ubuntu. Its open source nature means it free to use, distribute and modify if necessary. However, Linux operating systems have a reputation of being a little too techie for the average 'Joe' off the street.

The Google OS will have to be very easy-to-use if it is going to realistically challenge Windows and it will have to demonstrate clearly benefits on security and privacy issues. Google is a strong, well-recognised, trusted brand and this will give it a strong foundation.

There is also another OS that I have not mentioned and that is MAC OSX which comes with Apple's computers. As people have become very used to using iTunes and MAC the Apple OS looks like it is also coming to more prominence. While much of the focus is a showdown between Google and Microsoft a new OS will also affect Apple.

Who knows? What happens if another Search Engine or OS player comes on the market? How will these companies feel about splitting the market further? The IT/Online world is constantly evolving and anything is possible right now. Whatever happens Google, Microsoft, Apple and whoever else will have to integrate with each other to survive the fast-paced online world.

My old 60GB iPod packed in recently and I had to start looking around for a replacement. I was spoilt for choice with Apple's new range of iPhones, iTouchs, Nanos and other funky named gizmos. People have been going on and on about the iPhone about how brilliant and easy it is but I have to say I have not been convinced at its charm.

I ask myself is it really neccessary and practical to have everything in one device. Pretty soon our lives may be reduced to one little black box which will control everything!

The main argument that they throw at you is that it is good to have your iTunes library, videos and use of a mobile phone in one device. The first issue I would point out is that the iPhone's maximum capacity is 16 GB which is not ideal if you have a collection that is larger than this. It just means you have to spend ages swapping playlists when you get bored with your music. This is just a hassle especially as you have probably bought an iPhone to make things easier. As far as space goes, you can now get an iPod classic with a wapping 120GB for only £169.

The other point that my flatmate pointed out is if you want to connect it to your laptop and use as a modem - forget it! You can only use the iPhones built in browser to surf the internet. It will currently not allow the use of browsing on external hardware. Other standard 3G phones from Nokia, Sony Ericsson will allow you to do this.

The last issue is cost. For the most part the iPhone is a over-priced flashy bit of equipment that doesn't do any more than other mobile phones currently do at the moment. The handset on its own costs over £300. Alternatively you might get it cheaper by signing up for one of the mobile phone tariffs. However, in most cases you will end up paying the same if not more in the long run. Other mobile phones can already take pictures, play music, access the internet, etc and they do this at a comparitively lower price. It is also important to point out that they are significantly less bulky than the iPhone and do not have a massive screen that could get broken or scratched easily (see picture at the top!).

A lot of the people I have met with iPhones seem to band them in a kind of 'look at me I'm so cool' fashion. On closer examination it is often apparent that they are unaware of many of the features that it offers. Worse still some of them seem to also carry an iPod around with them as well which further defeats the object of having an iPhone in the first place. They obviously enjoy wasting their money.

Thanks very much but I'll settle for a new iPod Classic and a separate mobile phone.