I agree with Ryan: I don't think there is a "Google OS" product. To Google, the "operating system" is the browser, that's why they're putting money in Mozilla's pockets. Too bad Google Documents doesn't support Opera 9 yet (though if you append "&browserok=true" to the URL, you can at least create documents, not spreadsheets).
I reported many months ago that Microsoft's Virtual Earth web app was using SVG to render path data when getting directions. At the time, I complained that Google Maps was not yet doing it, though their code looked like it supported it. I was looking for directions and decided to check it out using Firefox's DOM Inspector - and sure enough, they are using SVG now to draw the path data in Firefox 2 (and using Microsoft's VML in Internet Explorer).
Ironically, Virtual Earth looks like it has much more functionality, yet most of it is broken in Firefox 2 (not in Firefox 1.5). For instance, the paths are not showing up for me in Firefox 2. Furthermore, Virtual Earth seem completely broken in Opera 9 which is a significant step backwards from 5 months ago.
Via Scoble, Microsoft has updated Live Local (aka "Virtual Earth"). I took a look and was delighted to find that in the Firefox version, they are using inline SVG to draw driving directions. Read the rest of this entry ...
Looks like Google Chat has implemented sound notifications. DownloadSquad reports that "Oddly, you need to have Flash enabled in order to hear the ping". Not exactly odd to me, as I mentioned before, there's no nice cross-browser way to do sound in the browser currently without using Flash. Kudos to Macromedia/Adobe for being so widely deployed and useful in this context. If nimble browser development camps like Mozilla could follow Opera's lead on implementing HTML5's Audio interface this would be a Good Thing.