Could Google be the next Microsoft?

That seems to the be the question on the New York Times’ lips today, as Google has launched two major software ventures this week:

* Google Talk, an instant-message and online-telephony (think: Skype-killer) client linked to your Gmail account, and

* Google Desktop 2, the newest release version of Google’s desktop and global information finder/organizer (think: Spotlight-killer)

Time will tell whether Google suceeds in their never-stated-but-surely-intended goal of making Microsoft’s Windows and other operating systems obsolete, but with $4 billion in capital soon-to-be-available and such runaway successes as Google Maps and Google Earth (among countless others) the writing sure seems to be on the wall:

There’s a new 800-lb gorilla in the room. And he wants you to play nice.