When I was writing recently about web browsers, I said look for innovation from Opera. They make a very cool and polished web browser that has never gained as much usage on desktop computers as it deserves. It is used widely on mobile devices.

Opera proved again this week they have been thinking outside the box.

They had been promising they’d announce news that would “re-invent the web”.  To support rhetoric like that, I was hoping the news would be more than just their Version 10 browser was out of beta.  Instead the announcement was Opera Unite, functionality that will allow Opera users to actually provide services from their web browser to other users on the web without the need to go through the “middleman” of a web server.

The sample services currently provided  tend to not be very original, a virtual refrigerator door to which you can allow others users to pin notes, a chat application so that you can host your own chat sessions, media sharing, file sharing and photo sharing.  Cool but not earthshaking (they admit it, they are just demo services.

The most interesting and possibly provocative of the initial services is a web server.   Imagine being able to easily post pages and files that could be seen by your dispersed family, your small workgroup, PTA, club, team or any small group that you’d like to be able to to disseminate information.  Pages can be public or password protected.

I also mentioned provocative since Opera will be forced to prove that they’re not creating a security risk by increasing the chance of hacking and contamination on individual users’ computers.

Still, the possibilities are endless if developers create sharing services for business and home that can be run directly on a web browser.  Expect to see this concept again in other browsers, they all “borrow. You can now not only own the printing press but the web server, too.

Download the Opera version with Opera Unite (alpha release).

Their pitch: