Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars
June 5, 2006
vs. 
I was skeptical Google could one day topple the mighty monopolist in Redmond in the Office market (web-based or otherwise), but recent developments have changed my mind.
Will Microsoft still be around in 20 years as a desktop-app publishing empire, or will they be overshadowed by kingmaker Google and its hundreds of millions of web-based G Office 2.0 users?
Here are the top 5 reasons I believe Google will win the Web-based Office 2.0 wars:
- Ajax Proficiency in Web 2.0 development and deployment expertise - Google has it, Microsoft doesn’t.
I personally believe a major handicap at MSFT is that they have to use their own dogfood, which doesn’t taste as good as some of the open-source alternatives (Ruby, Python, etc.)
Google developers, on the other hand, are free to use their technology of choice (generally speaking) for their 20% projects, including agile languages and frameworks like Python and Ruby. (even Java, though less agile) - Microsoft’s belated entry to the Web 2.0 / web-based app market. It took MS nearly 2 years to launch Live.com while kids in their basement were rolling out similar functionality that whole time in agile web frameworks based on Python, Django, Ruby on Rails, etc. The whole beauty of web-based app development is increased productivity & time to market. (Microsoft can’t seem to get this right yet.)
- Writely - a web-based MS Word killer. (if you haven’t used Writely since its initial launch, you have to see it now. It’s incredible.
Yes, there will always be a 5-20% of hardcore users that demand the extra functionality of a desktop-based Office. But for many casual users, an application like Writely, which will only continue to add additional functionality, will be able to solve their word-processing needs.
Also, how many times have you shuffled Word or Open Office documents back and forth via email? It gets kind of old after the 17th time. (and not everyone is savvy with managing docs via Subversion, etc). Writely solves this problem. - Google’s massive server farm - again an area where MS has a lot of catching up to do. It isn’t easy querying a 60 billion + document index and returning results in .14 seconds. Google’s core competency lies in deploying apps for hundreds of millions of web-based users. Microsoft’s lies in creating buggy desktop software.
- Google Spreadsheets (dropping tomorrow I hear at spreadsheets.google.com). Google’s web-based MS Excel killer. Some of the initial web-based spreadsheet apps (like numsum) that came out were pretty weak in functionality. You can guarantee that G Spreadsheets will launch with a boatload of features not found in the others.
- GMail - Google’s web-based MS Outlook killer. 2.7+ GB of ever-growing storage. After a year of usage I’m still only sitting at 493 MB (18%) of my 2731 MB.
If you still have not yet tried GMail, drop a note in the comments and I’m sure someone will send you an invite. (there are a million floating around now tho if you just google for it) - Google Calendars - MS doesn’t even really have a product in this space, unless you count Outlook’s builtin calendaring. (which sucks compared to the iCal & collaboration functionality in GCals)
- Google Presentations - Coming soon, no doubt! Google employees are very good about not disclosing any currently active development projects. But let’s just say I am 99% certain they have a Powerpoint-killer in the works.
Please comment below on additional reasons you think Google (or Microsoft) might win the Web Office 2.0 Wars.
I’ll update this list with additional reasons (or make a new list of why Microsoft might win) if you explain why in a comment below.
Updates:
The Free Hogg weblog makes a great point about schools no longer needing to shell out millions for MS Office licenses if Google comes up with a viable alternative.
[...] I also read a good post in the Ajax Blog that gives eight reasons why Microsoft stands no chance against Google and its army of servers in the web-based office quest. [...]
You have no idea what you are talking about. You have used just one sided coin. Microsoft has live calendar before your google. Live calendar rocks take care of user’s privacy concerns. Google let anybody see my daughter’s schedule. I initially told her not to use Google calendar. Well google coop shows to the world what you subscribed too. Well I just had to ask her to stop any google. Google search competitive advantage is gone compare to yahoo.
If you have used Microsoft’s product. You would realize that OWA is completely web-based solution and it beats today’s gmail in 2001 itself. But OWA is completely beaten by outlook. Moral, a general purpose browser based program (e.g. OWA is the best in email) can’t beat a special purpose program (e.g., outlook beats the best OWA handsdown).
If you want to do a fair comparison, I would ask you to use yahoo/msn/google equally for a month and see what you stick too.
I won’t hide like the above poster (btw Anonymous, Yahoo’s search couldn’t suck much more. Do some reasearch using the search APIs of Google and Yahoo. You will have no choice but to agree…), BUT I will say this — if you want to be taken seriously at all, PLEASE take the time to use Complete Words. ‘Tho’ is not a word. ‘Though’ is. ‘you gotta’ is nonsense. Even “You’ve gotta” is a substantial improvement.
Write like a caffiene-loaded 10 year old on MySpace and your opinions will be taken with the same massive grain of salt as when injesting the nonsense of said hypothetical 10 year old.
Andrew,
You’re right.
I don’t know what else to say. =)
Updated with a few minor grammatical corrections as suggested by andrew.
I was pretty amped up when I wrote it, and just put it live without any proofreading. Thx!
Google vs. Microsoft
Das Ajaxblog hat Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars. Besonders lieblich für alle Microsoft-Kritiker: I personally believe a major handicap at MSFT is that they have to use their own dogfood, which doesn’t…
I generally agree with your statements. One thing made that me laugh — when Google bought it, Writely was made out of MS brand dog food (.NET) Ha!
[...] 看完了Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars这篇文章,有几点看法: [...]
[...] 根據 ajax blog 的「Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars」這篇文章，大致上介紹了 Google 最近不斷推出的一些 Office 相關軟體，雖然現在這些軟體還算是在萌芽階段，不過全世界的人都相信 Web 軟體將吃掉不少桌面軟體的市場。 [...]
Hehe.. True. Are they still?
I’m not saying great things can’t be done w/ MS products.
Just, in general, we haven’t seen as much innovation in this space coming out of the MS / ASP.Net / C# community.
Maybe the Writely guys are just super studs or something and I’m not that bright…
But I seem to be about 5-10x more productve in Rails personally.
This could definitely be a Microsoft killer. Open office has “good enough” functionality, but is a pain to use. And, because of their integral place in the Web generation, I think Google has more credance in the market than Microsoft at this point. So busy with Vista, they forgot to keep up with the Joneses…
I think you should start to research before jumping the gun! You’ve basically just stated that the open source programming languages are better than Microsoft’s multi-million dollar languages! Are you made?! One example, if I was too make a web application which later i wanted to extend to the desktop in C# and .Net that would be easy, all through code reuse, if I wrote the web application in php, and then used java for the desktop application i would need to write all my code out again!!!
Google will never beat Microsoft on the Office edge, schools will never use Googles Office suite! Why would they teach kids too use an application that the majour companies in the world dont use? Why would they change when they already have the software in the first place?
Google can return search queries soo quick because everything is cached, it doesnt. Microsoft have a huge server cluster, bigger than googles by far!!
Microsoft do not make buggy applications, well they do but do you think they mean too? Have you ever made an application with bugs? Have you ever made a full operating system and not anything wrong with it first time?
You’ve basically stated in your post, that Google is kicking Microsoft’s ass. But you have no proof, everything is based on opinions! Do some research before you make critical comments about organisations that you know nothing about. Dont assume!!
I think you are comparing apples to oranges. That is two different business models. Google is an ad based model, MS is a licensed based model. MS is holding on to this outdated model because they can. Eventually I believe they, MS, will be forced to move to a true subscription based or usage based model, one that does not force users to upgrade. Kind of what we all want cable TV to be like where we can pick and choose stations, we can pick and choose features.
Microsoft is forcing consumption so are cable operators, but that’s a different issue, or is it? Also I guess MS could add a peer to peer feature in its office product to enable sharing and such.
Google Office will be an MS Office killer when it starts eating into office revenues. I do not see people abandoning excel for Google spreadsheet. It seems that Google Spreadsheet is actually a complement to Excel. You can create a spreadsheet in Excel and upload it in Google spreadsheet. This may actually increase the demand for Excel. When the demand for a products compliment increased the demand for that product increases (Ceteris paribus). One way to increase a demand for a products compliment is to lower the complements price. Free is as low as it gets. Therefore Google has released a free compliment to Excel, which may increase the demand for Excel.
Google is not in the business of killing MS they are in the business of making tons of money. All of Google’s Office products will probably compliment all of MS Office products, which again may increase the demand for MS Office. It would probably be a good idea for Google to make a plug in for all of MS Office products that imports them into the complimentary Google product. This can benefit both MS and Google.
well said DF…
[...] Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars | Ajax Blog totally agree with ‘Dean Fragnito’ on the 9th floor. “I think you are comparing apples to oranges. That is two different business models. Google is an ad based model, MS is a licensed based model.” (tags: google ajax microsoft webdesign office webOS) [...]
@DF said: “Google is not in the business of killing MS they are in the business of making tons of money.”
Right on brother. Look no further than to Sun to see what happens when your business goals switch to “killing a competitor” instead of providing users with a great service & business value.
I’ll make one point though: GMail has definitely been an Outlook Killer for me.
I can’t stand using Outlook after getting into the GMail swing of things.
This doesn’t apply to big corporations who will still be shelling out $ for MS licenses twenty years from now.
But by then I think the G Suite and Google way of creating webapps will have evolved enough to a point that for 80% of users, a web-based solution might be “good enough” and will no longer need MS Office.
@Adam - I coded in C# & ASP.Net nearly full-time for six months.
I’ve now been coding in Rails full-time for only two.
Yep, still 5-10x more productive in Ruby on Rails.
If you haven’t at least taken a look at & built some sample apps in RoR, I would highly recommend you do so at this juncture!
The hype is annoying but it’s there for a reason.
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[...] 根據 ajax blog 的「Top 8 Reasons Why Google will Pwn Microsoft in the Web-based Office Wars」這篇文章，大致上介紹了 Google 最近不斷推出的一些 Office 相關軟體，雖然現在這些軟體還算是在萌芽階段，不過全世界的人都相信 Web 軟體將吃掉不少桌面軟體的市場。 [...]