Here’s a short video that demonstrates that it’s all about:

Ubiquity for Firefox from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

What Ubiquity achieves is an alternative interface to harnessing the power of the services that already exist on the web (though I won’t go as far as using the buzzword Web Services). It’s an idea that has been proven through Mashups, however this power can now be accessed through natural language, just type what you want into the Ubiqity interface. It looks like a great piece of technology (although not ground-breaking) and has even made Scoble promise not to use IE8! I’ve installed it on this machine and will have a play, just remember it’s still a prototype and so might be a bit flaky.

Personally, I’m really happy to see this development as what it does is makes the browsing experience more useful to people who don’t have the technical skills to build stuff from scratch. Casual users shouldn’t need to learn those skills, just as you shouldn’t need to learn how to rebuild a carburettor is you want to drive a car. There’s even more information about this on Techmeme, so start reading!

Let us say, you want to buy a home in Liverpool for example. The search results page includes a map by Google Maps, property listings from a number of different agencies and a wealth of information about Liverpool including transport, police, pubs, schools and lots more. Under the bonnet, all this information is coming from a number of different websites and services, yet they are presented in a cohesive manner that gives the end-user an extremely rich experience. You get a similar experience if you’re looking to rent property in Liverpool or even flatshare in Liverpool. I’ve used Liverpool as an example, but they cover the whole of the UK, so the website is applicable to anyone here. (actually they do Spain also, but that’s another story)

The other thing I liked about the Nestoria is that there’s an attached blog which recounts some of the challenges they have faced in putting it all together, as well as serving as a discussion ground for new ideas and developing thoughts. Posts range from talking about the use of AJAX to make the site more usable, to their support of OpenStreetMaps. Speaking about OpenStreetMaps, Dan Karran is coming over the Isle of Man in September and I’m hoping to catch up with him.

I like Nestoria. It’s a great example of vertical search and demonstrates quite elegantly have effective mashups can be. Seems like the team meets up in a London pub every so often. I might just pop down and say hello one day.