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MS To Launch Internet Versions of Office And Windows
daria42 writes "In a press conference this morning, Bill Gates said Microsoft plans to launch Internet-based complements to its core products, dubbed 'Windows Live' and 'Office Live'. Windows Live is a set of Internet-based personal services, such as e-mail, blogging and instant messaging. It will be primarily supported by advertising and be separate from the operating system itself. Office Live will come in both ad-based and subscription versions that augment MS' Office suite. The programs won't replace the paid software but instead seem aimed at diminishing Google's ad revenue. Windows Live already appears to have 'gone live' in a preview format on the web."
Firefox Users :-)
Firefox support is coming soon. Please be patient
. Did I read that right? MS supporting Firefox?
Hmm. Cool.
Ahh, it seems Google's betas have given the name buzzword status...
:)
I remember the good old days when Microsoft's "beta" products were full versions... ahhhh...
Good to see Google's eminent technological takeover is at least causing Microsoft to be a little more honest
MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
Windows Live is a painfully bad rip off of Google's Personal Homepage. It all just Microsoft up to their old tricks: copy someone elses idea then try to extend it.
This time, however, the deck is stacked against them. Developers are leaving Microsoft and going to Google in hopes to make millions like early Microsoft employees did. Also Microsoft is stuck using their own software as a development platform which is not as flexible as Google or even Apple to make changes. Google can simply outcode Microsoft in the web arena.
Should be a bloodbath.
Ruby on Rails Screencast
If MS keeps developing awesome stuff like this, then go Bill. Weee.
Plus I get a warm and fuzzy feeling using "Windows Live" from Linux.
Google's pushing Microsoft into a corner... they've got a distinct edge in innovation...
:)
I definately smell a hint of doom on Microsoft, though... but in business, as good as it seems now... we'll just be trading one tyrant for another... call it FUD, but I guess we'll all see in time
MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
I hope they don't plan on using ajax or java script to do it. The IE java script interpreter is so damn slow it is like watching paint dry. I just tried to build a large scale app using a java script interface kit and failed. It failed not because the program was bad, as a matter of fact it was damn snappy in firefox. Then I did the unthinkable and loaded it up in IE, slow as mud to the point of being totally unusable. The next person that tells me how great IE is, I am going to punch in the teeth.
Got Code?
I saw some HTML + webified versions of Office when I worked there. Probably around 2000. They cancelled it. I wish I could remember more about it.
I really wonder how much they had to pay for live.com. According to whois the domain was just updated on Oct 31.
Is this really an official Microsoft site? It looks like it's probably a hoax. Microsoft wouldn't release something this unpolished and clearly inferior to Google's personalized homepage. Microsoft takes Google VERY seriously.
The first sentence on the page seems like a giveaway: "Your online world gets better when everything works simply and effortlessly together." Microsoft employs lots of good writers; I can't see something like that making its way through to a front page.
My tracert was inconclusive.
Also, is it just me, or does firefox do the same thing IE does there? Tried both, and it looks the same, with just the little Firefox users... banner at the top.
Obligatory Soundbite Catchphrase
This seems like it could be the beginning of everything moving to a more web-oriented computer experience. Who needs Windows when you can use Office, MSN, etc. FROM FIREFOX (under Linux). Windows could be left for professionals who need a robust platform to run "real" applications for things like video/image editing, CAD design, etc. Everyday users could do the most basic computer tasks in the same way under Linux as under Windows... I guess even if this kills Windows, Microsoft has a stake in it either way now...
live.com wow, wish i was the one who owned that name. Imagine how much money they payed for it.
$action = empty(PHP) ? backToC() : unset(PHP) ; "when the concrete cases are understood, the abstractions are readily
the "market" just doesnt realise they like it.
HTML & server side scripting are another form of "dumb terminal",
Hands up if you use a remote X session to a server for something, ditto VNC or NX
AND suns sunray thin client workstations are works of F***ing art damn it, they can pull more central server based tricks with those than any company buying them could ever want id. there are people that want these kinds of machines because it IS cheaper for them. If you are working on a number of platforms simultaneously with a number of groups/projects, its simpler to deal with one central server (real or virtual) for each reasonably sized team and platform they need and give them all their necessary enviroments. When the projects over theres only one machine to wipe and reinstall, not 10 or 20. They arent for everyone but they arent the rejected has beens you make them out to be.
Above all. the remote software pardigim is becoming more useful to the end users only now, while there has always been a set of proffessionals and technical types making use of it in various forms. Its only now with the explosion of the (god i hate using this term like this) Web 2.0 revoloution, that they have become aware that they dont have to be stuck on their computer all the time. They dont want to be. they want to be able to show someoen their stuff when theyre vistiting a freinds place, they want to be able to do stuff at work, or on vacation they did at home without the hassle. They want "their stuff" to be more available to them than ever. MS is tapping this in a big way now.
I just hope it kicks google to counter it, and revamp their now becoming stale personalised google.com/ig page design.
Minimalism like google is only one way to get a great UI,
and MS seem to have gotten a good one to counter it subtly.
overall, im pissed im hearing this from MS, come on google & sun, i cant stand this.
XML - A clever joke would be here if
I'm going to bank that they don't hurt Google in the least bit. Google has a customizable portal that I tried using for a while as well. And honestly I ended up back at the original Google page (well truthfully I'm using the suggest version... I love that page).
.02 copper though.
When it comes to searching the web... I don't want a portal and I'm going to assume that most people don't care. Portal services I use Yahoo, but I never use Yahoo for searching I use Google. It's simple and clean which is what i want in a search engine.
Microsoft is likely to hurt Yahoo in the portal arena for me if they can match and surpass what Yahoo currently offers though.
just my
"why don't you just slip into something more comfortable...like a coma!"
It was more than 2 years ago, more like 5 or so. Microsoft put out vapourware press releases about how they were moving from boxing products for sale in stores and instead moving to a subscription model where they host the app and you rent it off them. The reason at the time was that with the popularity of the Internet, *lots* of people were discovering just how bad Microsoft and their products were, and were thinking about subjects like "this really is a buggy, defective product - either fix it or give me my money back". Both of those choices means Microsoft lose money. So instead of selling someone a product which they own, the product is instead rented to them under very strict terms and conditions; we've seen Microsoft EULAs so we know what those terms are like - you can't use it to speak the truth (ie, say how bad Microsoft or their products are), you can't use it to compete with Microsoft in anything, you must sacrifice your firstborn child to the Redmond gods, yadda yadda.
Since there was such a huge backlash over this idea, they have instead been slowly but surely been edging towards it, sneakily bringing it about anyway. That's what the whole "genuine advantage" thing is about - tracking who is using their stuff so they can bill them via the subscription model once they drop the boxed versions from the shelves and all support. That's why there's this concept of "end-of-life" product with no more support - it's not just about forcing people to buy their same product again, its just getting people used to the idea that instead of a class-action lawsuit for continually defective products, you just upgrade. And if you have to upgrade so often it becomes a pain, maybe its easier to simply subscribe instead rather than buy this stuff you get no support for anyway?
Your homework is to go find out the other things they have done in the past decade to support their move towards the unaccountable subscription model. It's scary.
Matt
Back in the day when Microsoft were too stubborn/clueless/scared-shitless of thin-client computing, they did everything they could to kill the whole idea of network computing. They would hear nothing about how software would be delivered to lightweight machines over the network.
When Sun was saying "The Network Is The Computer", Micosoft was busily saying "Network? What Network? There's no network -- Hey, look, Clippy!".
And, now that they're trotting out what is, oh, what, a 10 or 15 year old idea, they're going to spin this and say they've innovated, and look at what they came up with.
The simple fact (IMO) is that Microsoft couldn't innovate the shit into a diaper. They rehash ideas other people have done, make incompatible implementations, and bray really loudly about how they're giving the consumer what they want.
It's only because Google is lining up to completely eat Microsoft's lunch in the area of web-delievered technologies that they're even beginning to look at this market segment. The difference being, Google implements it, releases it (and free SDKs for it), and then moves on to making other stuff. [ Witness an earlier story about a Carmen San Diego-esque game based on Google maps, Google pedometers, and god knows what else I've missed ]
As has been pointed out by smarter people than I, Google is leaving the actual technology in their wake. Microsoft is leaving press-releases and open-ended promises about what they might deliver in the future.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I bitch about Google enough as a user, and I suspect I'm not alone. You see, I don't use WinXP. They have a couple of really good apps that I'd love to see ported to open platforms, Picassa and Google Earth being two worth mentioning.
It's all well and good to say that Google's pro-open source, but when they fail to actually deliver the cool apps to an open platform, what does that say, exactly?
Sorry to bust your balloon but microsoft is fundamentally dedicated to a world where everyone pays a monthly subscription for microsoft products and there are no competitors and any potential competitors are locked out before they can even get started.
Fooled me once, shame on me- fooled me at least 15 to 20 times- well I guess I should assume you are trying to fool me on any future attempts. (convicted of stealing competitors products, well known tendency of breaking competitors products by tweaking the operating system, well known tendency to slow competitors products by tweaking the operating system or using illegal API's and still certifying product, bundling, giving away products for free until the competition is dead then never innovating, "embracing and extending" java, j++, the halloween memoes, "collaborating" on products with a competitor and then bringing out their own version using knowledge they picked up during the collaboration, etc. etc. etc.).
They are not just another large capitalist company. They are something unique and they want to lock that in forever. They bought or drove out of business every legitimate business that competed with them either legally or illegally (Stak/doublespace comes to mind- there are others).
Trust me, you don't know it but you really do want 4 to 5 solid OS's competing with many different products so that they keep each other honest.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
--
So who is hotter? Ali or Ali's sister?
"It's easy. It's live, and it has 'me' at the center of the universe," said Blake Irving, a Microsoft vice president who was on stage to demonstrate Windows Live.
Microsoft has the most obnoxious PR-speak of any corporation on earth. On the other hand, Google or Apple would just tell you what their product does and why you need it, usually in one sentence.
The point was that if the Microsoft page starts becoming widely used advertisers will have to make the choice between advertising on Microsoft's portal or with Google's Adsense and Adwords, thus reducing Google's revenue by splitting the ad market.
Microsoft can't even properly support Firefox with Hotmail. I will never once even attempt to log into live.com... You know what I mean about hotmail/Firefox... Various little things that don't work right.
Googles advantage with targeted adds is based around the high conversion rate when someone clicks on a Google add they are 2x as likely to buy something from that site as they are from yahoo. Thus people are willing to pay about 2x a much per click for Google adds vs any other type. Now if people really start using Microsoft's portal you might cut into MS's profit's but I don't expect that to be an issue. I use hotmail instead of gmail because I can't connect to gmail at work but I still use Google for search. For MS to cut into Google's profits they are going to have to compete in search AND provide an add service that is as profitable for other sites to use. (Addwords pay's a lot for little space and it fit's in with a lot of websites.) AND take over all the other Google websites that are supported by Addwords.
PS: Advertisers already have hundreds of options for advertising, as long as people are still looking at websites that are willing to use addwords MS is not goign to cut into Googles profits. In some ways advertising is a zero sum game, but Google is only a tiny fraction of overall advertising. If MS where doing 30billion / year in web adds it would do little to Google's bottom line.