So, how are the Microsoft wannabes doing out there on the market? Well, I’ll bet you’ve heard that Microsoft is still in business and that Office is still the top seller at about $60 billion (yep) in Office sales last year. Honestly folks; sometimes I wonder why we need yet another choice out there. Now, Cisco is considering making an entrance into this market, but while it seems like this is just one more example of “don’t we have enough,” there are sound reasons for this.
A couple of years ago Microsoft was lucky enough (?) to have the OOXML format declared the standard by ISO. They played that particular game like they have so many others – wooing the folks they previously called “a cancer,” lulling them into a false sense of security, and then swooping down for the kill with ISO. By controlling that standard, they have forced the hands of millions, but still, the world marches on and technology with it. SAAS applications like WebEx Connect have been forcing some creativity and change to come out of Microsoft. Still, with this latest announcement – Cisco coming up with a service that will allow users to share and create documents over the WebEx service, Microsoft isn’t sitting still.
In Office 14, aka Office 2010, Antoine Leblond, Sr. VP of the Office Productivity Applications Group explains that the web applications coming are “lightweight, cross platform, cross browser versions of Word, Powerpoint, Excel and One Note.” All this mumbo-jumbo really means that you’ll be able to create documents using the familiar look and feel of Office directly in your browser – and that means even when your browser is on your cellphone. For bloggers like me it means we’ll finally be able to do things like put Powerpoint presentations in our blogs without clumsy, constantly malfunctioning add-ins. I still want to ask the question, though – just because we can do this, does it really mean we should? Aren’t we distracted and struggling to keep up with the pace of the world enough as it is?
Humor me – Do we really need to be able to do this on our cellphone? I don’t mind the idea of being able to read these things on the phone, but actually work on them? Maybe I’m from a different planet, but the last time I checked we had some serious problems out there. We need people focusing on serious issues like how to feed folks who are starving, how to get our country away from being dependent on fossil fuels, and how to get our cars to run and our electricty to happen and how to create green building materials and get everyone who needs it medical care and, oh, so many other things…. And somewhere, deep down in my heart, it ticks me off to know that people are getting paid and using resources and ev en occupying chairs to create this stuff when all these other things need to be solved! I know there are those who will argue how having these other techie things happening will allow better communication and faster solutions to be generated for those other real problems in the world; but you know what? After all these years and all these “advancements” the top reasons that projects still fail are still due to lack of human touch and face-to face communications. Given that, it just seems like there is something seriously weird about typing or creating something on a cellphone. I guess Microsoft needs more money and so does Cisco. Who can blame them – don’t we all?
Comments
MS makes $60B/year on office products only because they have a monopoly on the software platform (OS) and file format. Opening the file format solves half the problem and will allow competition among vendors. Competition will save organizations -including governments- billions of dollars. Those saved billions can be spent by government to help the hungry or by corporations to develop technology to reduce our dependence on oil.
Bringing the document to the network (sharing) is about bringing the document away from MS's platform (OS), helping to break MS's monopoly. The cell phone thing is a side effect.
Unfortunately, MS deliberately broke the ISO process that standardized their file format. This means that MS may not face real competition for some time. MS is buying time to extend their monopoly - $6B/month is a lot.
Help save money by using and promoting a format other than MS's - try ODF, supported by OpenOffice and other vendor apps. Gov'ts esp. should not be paying the MS
isnt this a technology site? quit posting crap you stupid hippy. there's no reason for us to care about world starvation, because america isnt part of the world. USA is the world and no one's starving here- doing great. So STFU.
USA is NOT the world! Get over yourself! It's narrow minded people like you that ruin this planet!
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