In three years desktops will be irrelevant

Google believes that in three years or so desktops will give way to mobile as the primary screen from which most people will consume information and entertainment.

That's according to Google Europe boss John Herlihy who said that smart phones enhance Google's mission to make information universal. Speaking at the Digital Landscapes conference at UCD, Herlihy said that the cloud-computing opportunity will make sure that every mobile device will be capable of doing rapid-scale applications. "In three years time, desktops will be irrelevant. In Japan, most research is done today on smart phones, not PCs," Herlihy told a baffled audience, echoing comments by Google CEO Eric Schmidt at the recent GSM Association Mobile World Congress 2010 that everything the company will do going forward will be via a mobile lens, centering on the cloud, computing and connectivity.