Finally : Google Sidebar

via WallStreet Journal (subscription required)

"The free program, known as Sidebar, presents consumers with a pane of customized information -- such as weather forecasts, stock quotes, news headlines, text feeds from favorite Web sites, photo slideshows and email alerts -- that sits alongside whatever else the user is viewing. It provides some functions similar to Yahoo's popular MyYahoo customized Web-page service."

Hopefully librarians will be able to integrate their subscribed sources into the search functionality. more on this at google's side