

Microsoft Office to go online — for free - breck
http://bigtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/07/13/microsoft-office-to-go-online-for-free/

======
jimbokun
If this is true, Google Docs can be declared a strategic success. Microsoft
will be sacrificing significant revenue by offering a free version on the web.
Figuring out how to distribute features between the free and paid versions
will be tricky, too. If people can't figure out whether they are supposed to
use the free web version or the paid version, they will be confused and upset
just like Vista customers who couldn't figure out which version to buy.

A lot of risks for Microsoft, with little upside. Eric Schmidt must be smiling
right now.

~~~
jsz0
The upside for Microsoft is Google completely failed to capitalize on their
head start with Google Docs. An online version of Office is going to be huge
for Microsoft. People who wouldn't pay $300 for Office 2010 may pay $30/year
for more storage and features of an online version. The free version is a
gateway not only to an up-sell a Pro version but also to other Microsoft web
services. In my opinion Google basically handed Microsoft a golden opportunity
to extend their 2nd biggest product to the web by failing to develop Google
Docs into a legitimate, fully featured, online office package. They forced
Microsoft's hand, sure, but they are doing them a favor too by forcing them to
change their business model in a good way. This is finally a service where
Microsoft will have an opportunity to compete with Google toe-to-toe without
the disadvantage of being late to the game.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Perhaps Google failed to capitalise on it because the price they're charging
is the most anyone is prepared to pay for online office applications.

What is Google Docs missing that you think MS can do so well they're going to
win market share.

Excuse my skepticism but I'll be watching this only to see what idiocy MS has
built in - requires silverlight to enable doc viewing / interstitial NSFW
advertising in business documents / only works by using ActiveX / trys to
install a Bing toolbar in all browsers before it'll work / relies on
proprietary javascript extensions / uses 4GB of memory ... place your bets.

------
thorax
Not so sure this warrants the negative comments. I mean, I'd rather see them
go this route than not go this route.

There's some indirect implications of this that I like, too--

By Microsoft's account, Office web is probably the largest javascript/ajax app
ever written (or at least really big). They also support Firefox, Safari, and
(maybe) Chrome.

I can't fathom how this won't put Microsoft into the javascript performance
arms race with IE. How can they not invest heavily in making their own browser
lightning fast with complicated ajax apps when all the browsers they support
will perform better with Office web than IE?

Just seems to me that with every browser competing to have incredible web
performance and compatibility, we're all going to win a bit in this case.

~~~
catch23
they might cheat and just use activex objects. Of course this means that
office won't work on non-windows computers, but I have a feeling they won't
care about supporting those.

~~~
thorax
From what I read, it sounds like they use mostly JS (as it works in Firefox
and Safari). I did see mention that perhaps a few corner case features use
Silverlight (which I expected to be 100% of the features), but it remains to
be seen how much they depend on that.

~~~
catch23
I only mentioned it because another company (Intuit) has Quickbooks available
online via the web, but you need a copy of Quickbooks in order to run it
because it uses ActiveX objects that reference libraries from Quickbooks.
Strange way to implement their web strategy!

------
enomar
I only hope you'll be able to share documents (at least for viewing) with
people that don't have a Microsoft account.

I really don't want to start getting emails from people asking me to log into
MS Office 2010 so I can view their "MUST SEE" power point presentation. It was
so convenient (and fun) to just tell them I don't have Office.

------
jacquesm
right. I'm sorry, but the microsoft version of 'free' is not so appealing to
me any more. We spent considerable time and money breaking the last bits of
heritage from our 'lock in', it would take a very serious reason to get back
in to it.

The only reason we still have a single windows machine is because it seems
canon scanners are supported on windows only, other than that it's all linux
or apple now.

And this being microsoft, and for now it being vapourware I'll hold my breath
to see if it is really free or if there is some catch.

~~~
aneesh
It's not vaporware. I saw a demo of it several months ago, and I'd bet it's
feature complete by now, or close.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Yeah, I saw a unicorn yesterday. Unicorns totally exist. I bet they've bred
with dragons by now and can totally, like, breath fire and stuff.

------
quizbiz
Microsoft already has free file sharing: <http://www.officelive.com:80/en-
us/file-sharing>

------
onreact-com
Too late. Also MS Office is too bloated. Google Docs, Zoho, Think Free
dominate the market for years. Microsoft can't just grab it.

~~~
mackeeeavelli
Users are going to migrate to the brand which elicits the most trust. When
Office online launches watch closely... Microsoft's real brand value will be
demonstrated. I think Redmond is going to be very disappointed with the ill
will they've generated for themselves.

