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Microsoft to Sell Outlook Subscription Service
An anonymous contributor writes "Boston.com is reporting that Microsoft will begin selling Outlook as a subscription service to compete with add-on services provided by Yahoo and Google. 'The new service, which costs $59.95 per year, will let people organize e-mail, contact lists and calendars in their online Hotmail accounts using the Microsoft Outlook program most often found on businesses' desktop computers.' I can't see many users paying for this service. Most Hotmail users use it because it is free, or they don't know about the alternatives. Paying for access via Outlook doesn't seem to fit with that market segment."
TFA Article Says:
Microsoft is smart to take advantage of a popular core product -- Outlook -- to help make Hotmail more attractive to sophisticated users.
They're not targeting fungrl149@hotmail.com here. They're targeting the exact segment of the market that Gmail appeals to now. Gmail took free web mail and turned it into a legitimate and attractive service. MS would now like to up the ante a bit and charge a little (and the dude said the price was 'steep', so it'll probably come down before launch) and provide more feature richness for that money. It's just another step towards the increasing legitimacy and acceptance of online services either replacing or merging with traditional desktop applications. I'm no fan of MS, but their participation in the advancement of web based email services or other apps is part and parcel of the general move forward.
I Want To Believe
In related news, FlyByNight Inc has announced that it will begin offering Outlook Express in a new reverse-subscription method. "We'll give users $59.95 per year to use this email program without antivirus software. Just install it, and we'll put your check in the mail right away," FlyByNight's Vice President of Public Relations, I. 0wnzJ00 explained.
Steve Ballmer initially acknowledged FlyByNight's efforts, stating, "We haven't been able to give it away - we bundled it with Windows, and people go out of their way to uninstall Outlook Express. We applaud FlyByNight's new distribution methods."
What's your damage, Heather?
Now I can pay for worms and viruses!
I suspect that the road warrior might use this - independant contractors (one man companies, in other words) who need to be able to access their email from anywhere, but might also want to do stuff like sync their Palm, or manage their stuff more quickly than can be done easily through Hotmail. I do agree Microsoft isn't likely to make much money off it, though it might be profitable once it's up and running as it'll cost little to maintain over and above their regular Hotmail servers.
ISP's don't provide 250Mb of email, and if you change ISP's you lose your email address. That's one of the benefits of a "hotmail" is that you're not locked to a certain ISP. I Know people that have stayed with dialup simply because they didn't want to go through the process of changing their email.
I don't they're selling access via Outlook.
I think they're renting the Outlook software itself. I have Outlook and can access my hotmail through it currently. That's been a feature for a while.
What they're offering here is a cost-effective model to acquire Outlook to use with Hotmail...
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
For just $5.95 per year you can purchase the blue screen portion of the service. For 19.95 per year, you get both the blue screen and clippy portion of the service.
Uh oh! Firefox is getting more popular! Thunderbird is becoming a viable email client! You're losing ground! What do you do? Quick, think! I've got it! Charge people yearly for stuff you didn't used to!
Against stupidity the Gods themselves contend in vain.
This is wonderful news for Mozilla. With the increasing popularity of FireFox among non-geeks, now is the perfect time to convert Outlookers to Thunderbird.
Sounds like .Mac.
Which is to say, not as crazy as it seems on the surface. If people really like the MS application, and like being able to access it anywhere, they're liable to pay.
Big if, though.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
People see surfrdood344@hotmail.com on my resume and say, "this guy means business"...
being able to have easier access to my hotmail account? priceless...
Diane: right you are, Tom. i know several have "jumped on the Bandwagon", already.
Tom: nice contribution, Diane.
Diane: and you're a piece of trash, Tom.
If Evolution/Open-Xchange can import all Outlook data, this is a great opportunity for Microsoft to educate their Hotmail customers on the benefits of switching, then steal them for the superior Evolution/Open-Xchange platform. Especially when Evolution runs on Windows, too, and we can host Open-Xchange on Linux. The PIM server biz will explode in the coming few years, especially when others follow Palm's lead in including "MS-Exchange" sync with their mobile "phone" PIM SW.
The key obstacle, as usual, is MS-proprietary data formats and protocols. The MS-Ex sync protocol is available for licensing. And PIM data uses standard vCal and VCard data, though there are MS-proprietary formats, too. Our Open community can pull this off with many people each doing our small part to reengineer those formats, and get Evolution/Open-Xchange to seamlessly import the native MS formats. MS is blinking - let's hit 'em between the eyes!
--
make install -not war
When I first read this article I saw this as a really stupid decision by Microsoft. It didn't seem to make any business sense at all. Then I saw it for what it really is. It's phase one in Microsoft's overall strategy to turn Office into a subscription service.
Little by little, piece by piece, you'll see various Office applications offered as a service, with the ultimate goal of making users pay the Microsoft tax once a year.
Gates isn't an idiot. He's seeing the ever increasing upgrade cycle. Let's face the facts, Office 2003 offers very few new useful features to your typical Office user than was there in Office 2000. Some would argue that all the way back to Office 98. He would love to get users into a subscription model. If you don't pay the yearly tax, your cut off, just like that.
Lots. GMX provide you with WebDAV, Ireland On Line did/do. Both free. Both can be used for Outlook calanders, or iCal calanders, or Evolution calanders...
folders are limiting, whereas labels are not. gmail is converting mail to the new paradigm, rather than the quagmire it's been stuck in for 20+ years.
Ok I just did the test and I can still use OE to attach to hotmail and get all sorts of fuctionality (like managing my folders) And I did not have to pay for it. SO why again would I use this service when I can get a better one for free with OE, pluss I don't have to shell out megabucks for office to use it. (Ok I have to use the bug-laden, insecure and dangerous OE but hey there are always trade offs.)
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
I believe it is an HTTP-based proprietary access method. It's been a while since I used it, but it didn't support IMAP itself, but rather proprietary extensions in Outlook/Outlook Express. Or you could use POP when running a daemon to talk to it like HotPop
No it's not, the replacement of static folders with more flexible labels does not change the basic model of email. There's no doubting it's a cool feature, but it's very much evolutionary rather than revolutionary.
The only paradigm that's been shifted by GMail is that marketeers now have direct access to their potential customers' emails and so have an unprecedented window in to the mind of their market.
Gates isn't an idiot. He's seeing the ever increasing upgrade cycle. Let's face the facts, Office 2003 offers very few new useful features to your typical Office user than was there in Office 2000. Some would argue that all the way back to Office 98. He would love to get users into a subscription model. If you don't pay the yearly tax, your cut off, just like that.
Yup. It used to be that you had to innovate if you wanted customers to trade in the old one and buy a new one. But that's too much work. I'm sure companies would like to do nothing else but sit there and get paid, and by adopting these new strategies, they can do just that. There will be no more using Office 2000 for 5 years because it's good enough. Now you'll have to give them your money every year, whether you want the new features or not.
I'm sure other companies will join the new model, and you won't be able to actually "own" anything anymore. Open source throws a wrench into those plans though. (so it must be outlawed!)
I have comcast and the email seems to work fine...I can access it via thunderbird or the web...
however friends with hotmail/yahoo/whatever often suffer delays when sending/receiving messages, etc. I can see if you don't want to change an email address for a business, but otherwise I don't see the point now that POP3 access is a "premium" feature.
and why in the world would anyone pay $60 a year for a crippled version of outlook of all things? If you are using webmail in the first place I doubt you really need something with all of the functionality of outlook.
i saw the baby, and the baby looked at me
With Microsoft Exchange becoming less favored in many corporate datacenters, and the threat of open source PIMs coming to Windows, like Evolution or Chandler, this change has the appearance of Microsoft making an effort to convince people to use servers they control to store PIM data and messages.
This gives Microsoft an excellent lock-in strategy, further down the road -- not only would you have to change email addresses to change clients, you would have to rebuild your contact database, transfer your calendar items, etc.
The only part that I find surprising, here, is that Microsoft would bother charging for the service. Why not make it free, then turn it to a pay service when they have properly locked up your data in their servers?
Weapons of Mass Analysis
The Outlook subscription service was covered back in September of last year. The only difference between then and now is the price they've settled on.
I'm not good in groups. It's difficult to work in a group when you're omnipotent. - Q
The sad thing is, is that Microsoft will probably make a good chunck of change on this. There are a lot of people who refuse to see that there is a world out there other than Microsoft.
Friends of my wife and I had a bunch of spyware on their PC. I cleaned up there system and then put Firefox on there. I said, "Use this instead. It's just as easy as IE, but you won't get as much malware on your system."
They said, "Ok!"
The next day I came by and somehow they figured out a way to get the IE icon back on their desktop and set up as the default browser. I was floored. Non techies can do amazing feats to fulfill their stubbornance to use second grade products and services. There's a buddy of mine who pays for some fancy MSN junk. I told him, "You can do that all for free. Yes, even on Windows" He's still a subscriber.... Sad, isn't it?
IMHO this is where MS would like to go. Having a hosted web service model gives a dependable revenue stream that makes the Wall Street analysts salivate. Knowing that you have X numbers of users paying Y amount/month is a reliable predictor of future revenue.
This also allows MS not to worry about license revenue and allows them to control the spitgot. If you can turn a service off or on then you put a serious clamp on the pirating of your software.
The company I work for is in the final stages of turning off the licensed customers. The code line is deadended and will be eliminated in the future years. The only way to get our service will be to pay a user fee for out hosted web service.
This is great for the company because we now control updates, releases, etc. and don't need the customers permission. We turn on access for new users and when the users get to a certain number we add a few more machines to the server farm. We use the same open source applications to provide the web servers and leverage the databases to handle many clients on the single license.
Over time we have seen the 'cost per transaction' reduce and the 'cost per deployment' reduce but we still charge the same amount. This increases the margins and thereby increases our profitability.
MS would love to get to the same place.
Regardless of the merit (or lack thereof) of the Outlook mail client (note that this is the full outlook client, not outlook express), this could be really really big in the small/med business world.
Exchange server is pretty expensive to set up and maintain for the average small business, but integrated, shared calendaring/scheduling/contacts/etc. in the familiar Outlook interface is a nice feature for most businesses with more than a few employees.
The roadwarrior aspect is quite nice too. If the office person can get online and add/edit appointments for the travelling person's contacts and calendar, then that's the shiz, as far as many of my clients are concerned.
I am not sure how much of exchange's functionality they will be selling with this, but if its essentially Exchange connectivity for 60 bucks a year per seat, I can think of several clients I have that will be immediately interested.
disclaimer: I support Windows, Linux and Novell, pretty much in that order of volume. I am not married to Microsoft, but not a basher either. I have over a dozen Linux boxes in the field, in active use at my clients.
Styrofoam IS biodegradable, you're just impatient!
Gmail Invites? Surely, you can't be serious. Next thing you know, somebody will offer us Free iPods!
And Slashmail's offering is better than Microsoft's Outlook Live in many ways:
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
You're either with the Change Management Consultants, or you're with the terrorists.
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!