Gears will be installed

Gears will be installed

Google already has something for offline use of Gmail and other Google apps, it's called Gears. It turns the web into a distributed file system with database-like properties (SQlite), and that's actually the right idea.

IMHO, the internet needs a complete architectural overhaul from bottom to top, and the things Google is doing (Gears, SPDY) are somewhat right on track on their level (that's fixing flaws in HTTP). And when you think the browser is not up to some task (like VoIP, or providing a good GUI for the app), well, that can be changed, too.