First, I can’t believe that Google, too, has gone the iSomething route. It’s cool, sure, but it doesn’t dance well with their other product names, and it sounds like a cheap Apple ripoff.

Now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, let’s see what’s new in Google’s personalized portal. Besides the new name - iGoogle - not much - the page is pretty much the same as before, except now mine has an ugly visual bug, as featured in the screenshot below.

However, there are many new gadgets (that’s what modules/widgets are called in Google and Vista - don’t ask) available, and the process of creating a gadget (which before required some moderate programming knowledge) is now much easier, so anyone can create a simple gadget. Actually, it’s so simple that it actually works as a wizard, explained in detail in the official iGoogle documentation.

The battle of personalized portals is heating up, as new features are introduced more often in the most popular ones. For an overview of the personalized portal space, check out our recent coverage.