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Google Apps Premier Edition Launches
prostoalex writes "Google Apps is adding a premium offering: a custom 10-GB Gmail box, Google Calendar, GTalk instant messenger, Writely, Google Pages, Google Custom home page iGoogle and Google SpreadSheets for $50 a year per employee. The NYTimes provides some details on competitive pricing: 'By comparison, businesses pay on average about $225 a person annually for Office and Exchange,... in addition to the costs of in-house management, customer support and hardware, according to the market research firm Gartner.' Boston.com quotes an analyst for Nucleus Research on Google's ease-of-use: '"What we see in the Google Apps is a real focus on making them easy to use and intuitive," she said. "And that's something that Microsoft has been unable to do in all of its years with Office."' But the same analyst is bearish on Google Apps' shortcomings relative to the mature Microsoft desktop products: 'Right now Google's going to give companies a better ability to negotiate with Microsoft.'"
I use the google apps at home, even though I have a licensed copy of office, cause I like to access it easily from work and home.. However, the one very limiting factor is the spreadsheets won't connect to databases. Lots of businesses have excel doing simple DB reporting, and this just won't work with the spreadsheet app. (yet??)
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Is that really a fair comparison, though? Google's email is great, but their Spreadsheet and Word Processor solutions are nowhere near as sophisticated as MS Office. And in an office environment, many of those differences do matter.
I haven't played with Google Calendar enough, but would it be a workable replacement for the Outlook calendar? i.e. Can you schedule meetings with a simple invite rather than telling everyone to put it on their calendar? Can other users see your unavailable periods when scheduling?
I hate to give Microsoft props, but there are features that are critical to the office use of software. If Google doesn't provide those features, they will not be able to compete at all. Which means that the supposed "leverage" with Microsoft would be nothing more than hogwash.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
being able to access your data and apps anywhere is just as useful when your laptop gets stolen.
In the en it is a mixed bag. Somethings will require local data. Other times i really miss having everything on the network. Finding a balance between the two will be the best bet.
Besides a corporation or government who gives their employees data to take home is just asking for trouble. How much of ten's of thousands of customer personal data has been lost your way?
I just am tired of waiting for corporations to stand up and upgrade their networks to even present standards. the USA doesn't even have 3G yet Japan and europe are working on going beyond that.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
I was about to moderate this discussion, but I had to respond to you. Instant Messaging, despite rumors to the contrary, can actually be a very productive tool at work. My company uses Lotus Sametime, and I have found it to be a very useful way to get responses to quick questions. No, you cannot hold major discussions over Instant Messaging. And, if you work in a small (
IMHO, the productivity that is gained by Corporate IM easily outshines to potential pitfalls.
My company has been interested in Google Apps for a while, but we won't touch it until we can buy an Google Apps appliance machine and install it in our own facility.
We're not holding our breath.
In the course of every project, it will become necessary to shoot the scientists and begin production.
Why would a company entrust Google with all their corporate emails, and many of their files as well?
Make a difference: move to a swing state.
We use a Jabber-based system at my office. If you are not on it at all times, the boss gets pissy. It's the primary way we communicate in-office. We mostly use it to send links to folders on the file server, or to get quick responses to questions.
I would use this, if google offered me the facility to install these apps on a server under my control.
In a large office with hundreds of users, having all that traffic heading out through the wan interface would be prohibitive, it would be much easier to only have the few off-site workers traffic heading in through the wan interface instead.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
For what you get, and for everything that you *don't* have to buy, that's idiotically cheap.
You probably just got distracted by an instant message while typing.
if by boo you mean yeah, boo-yeah!
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
Welcome back to 1975, where mainframes and 'pay as you go' computing ruled the day.
The Personal Computer, if google/microsoft have their way, will cease to exist. Welcome back the dumb terminal.
Let google/microsoft store all your data, for a low monthly fee.
Use all your favorite applications, for a low monthly fee.
It's the old micropayment bullshit, disguised as a new 'pay as you go' initiative. Same shit, different smell.
1975 called, it wants its 'micropayment' system back.