That's a fair idea.
I was thinking something along the lines of a "Start page/Home page"
That being, you can create a site which is like a UK portal, so people set that page as their "home page" (Every time you open your browser), it could be customised to the users preference, so it could contain things such a local news, local weather, time, personal calender/diary, perhaps web based email integration...a lot of work but most of the news stuff could be done through RSS from regional news sites etc.