Google's got a firm grip on the cloud scene with multiple offerings that are efficient and encourage more collaborative usage. I personally think Micorsoft were a little slow on the uptake as far as the cloud scene is concerned which has cost them a major portion of the market share in this regard. My experience with skydrive though, has been very good and I think in the not so distant future google might have a real competition on its hands.
Maria - I'm sure it'll be hard for Microsoft to switch to an entirely new revenue model. But I daresay it should, at the very least, rethink their consumer and small business market since it isn't (I think) as lucrative as the enterprise market. For consumers, there's no economies of scale to provide the savings that bulk licensing does, so there's a lot of piracy. But what if Microsoft charges the same rate that Google does for Google Apps for Business, i.e. $5/user/mo, but providing desktop, web and mobile office apps as a service? I'd be glad to pay that amount for the power of Microsoft Office. On the other hand, if I were in an enterprise context, I'd save more per user by giving Microsoft a big wad of cash for desktop software. Microsoft can still keep its cash cow while entering an affordable consumer subscription model.
The latest version of the online Outlook - which is not part of the standard Office Web Apps -- has offline access, but it doesn't look like Office Web Apps do.
You can use Google Docs offline on your desktop - -and also on your Android and iOS devices -- if you set it up.
Maria - I, too, am surprised that the Microsoft Web app requires a conversion for Excel. That takes away one of the biggest advantages of using a Microsoft app: Compatibility with other people using Microsoft apps.
Well, yes, there is also the matter of pricing. As a whole though, I feel that Google Docs' features and functionalities are a better fit for me and with how I work. Like you mentioned, it's also especially convenient for collaborations, which most projects require.
Microsoft is in a bit of a no-win position here. If it makes its Web Apps 100% compatible with Office and free for everyone, why would anyone bother to buy Office at all? And Office is a big cash cow.
Meanwhile, Google is under no such constraints -- if anything, improving Google Docs will improve adoption of its premium Google Apps for Business platform, increase use of its ad-supported products, and increase use of its Android products.
This is the classic "Innovators Dilemma".
The standard answer to it is: "Destroy your business model before someone else does it for you."
The problem with that is it takes a LOT of courage to go out and kill your top source of income. So far, it doesn't look as though Microsoft has that much courage.
It is a huge gamble. What if Microsoft releases 100% compatible Web Apps, and everyone switches over, it loses revenue from Office -- and nothing else takes its place?
You could argue that corporations would still buy enterprise licenses, some people will still want a standalone copy of the software, for when they're not online, and advertising will make up the difference. But that's a big, big if.
Google Docs does better obviously because it's been around longer. I started using it the moment it got rolled out, and I got frustrated with it like many other users did. There were so many simple things you couldn't do. But today, many years later, I use Google Docs 95% of the time, with the 5% going to MS Office because there's some formatting or functionality issue in Docs.
Maybe seven years from now, Microsoft Office Web Apps will improve dramatically. Or we could already be manipulating pivot tables with Google Glasses as Microsoft scrambles to catch up.
Even companies with a firm commitment to Office and with fully licensed copies of it everywhere can still get use out of Web apps.
Say, for example, you're on the road, and need to quickly create a spreadsheet or letter and send it off. If you're using a strange computer, one which doesn't have Office on it -- a library computer, or a friend's computer -- then the Web apps are great.
The apps are also useful when you're traveling with a tablet and don't have the tablet version of Office installed. (Or one of the various work-arounds.)
I also find Google Docs useful for collaboration. For example, I frequently work on contracts with a colleague in Europe. I create the contract in Google Docs. He takes a look at it, makes corrections. I can easily see what he did, and we're always looking at the same version of the document -- we don't have multiple versions of it being emailed back and forth.
When we're all set, I save it as a PDF and ship it off to the client.
I have not tried Google Docs or Office Web Apps. My company just installed Office 2010 last year so I do not foresee them migrating to a cloud solution any time soon. However, after reading this article, I will try them both to see which one works better for me. Maybe by the time my company is ready to migrate to a cloud solution and they have a forum for user input, hopefully, I will be able to provide some insight on the pros and cons of both. But we are a Microsoft shop so it may be a little difficult to switch over to Google. Then again, if the price is right, Google may win the bid.
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Social media has been with us for a decade -- but employer policies and the law are anything but firm about the most appropriate usage of this powerful tool.
Businesses often struggle to decide which domain to use. When it comes to purchasing a domain name, you have plenty of extensions to choose from, ranging from .com and .net, to .me, and even .mobi. But which one should you pick?
I've been writing about how the next evolution of the Internet might just be an advertising revolution, and how corporate IT can stay involved as the enablers and providers of the technologies that make this possible.
In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
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M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
