Monetize Your Gadget With New Canvas View For iGoogle

Google today announced the launch of the canvas view feature to iGoogle users in the U.S., rolling out over the course of the day. The canvas view feature allows gadget developers to build richer content, games, and UI for iGoogle's tens of millions of users by allowing them to build powerful full-page applications.

In addition, canvas view provides developers with the opportunity to monetize their gadgets.

This new iGoogle version allows users to expand a gadget to access more content. For example, now users can read news, play games and watch videos in full-page view, without leaving their homepage. A few examples of gadgets that take advantage of this new canvas view mode include:

• News - The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post offer users the option to view full-page text and videos that load quickly.
• Games & Fun - The Sudoku gadget lets users play full-page sudoku puzzles -- there are thousands of puzzles to choose from -- without squinting at 6 point font. The Go Comics gadget lets users select which comics they want to see and read them in a full-screen view
• Entertainment/media - The TV Guide gadget provides full-screen TV listings that can be localized by zip code, celebrity news, and photos. If the user likes to watch movies more than TV, Flixster's movies gadget gives the user access to trailers, ratings, theater information, and more. For music lovers, the iLike gadget gives users access to news, concerts, and even free MP3s from their favorite musicians. Users can also watch the best videos from YouTube and Current News in full screen view.
• Communication/tools - With the Gmail gadget users can now perform simple actions on Gmail without leaving their iGoogle page, like send or reply to emails. The weather gadget allows users to dive into detailed hourly weather forecast and even air quality information for their local area. The Google Finance canvas view gadget provides full-screen finance charts and news of the stocks in their portfolio.

For a full list of highlighted canvas view gadgets, see:

http://www.google.com/ig/v2landing

Also, there is a change in iGoogle interface, like replacing the tabs with left navigation. This allows users to jump from one canvas view to another with only one click.

To get started, check out the documentation and examples on the iGoogle developer website.