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Boston Replacing Microsoft Exchange With Google Apps
netbuzz writes "The city of Boston, which employs 20,000 people, has become the latest large organization to switch from Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps. The city estimates that the move will save it $280,000 a year. Microsoft's reaction? 'We believe the citizens of Boston deserve cloud productivity tools that protect their security and privacy. Google's investments in these areas are inadequate, and they lack the proper protections most organizations require.' More and more customers aren't buying that FUD."
Hopefully they'll be more satisfied than Los Angeles was (PDF).
The issue is that Microsoft's privacy track record is worse.
When George W. Bush demanded all search engines hand over search data tied to IP addresses for all users, Google was the only search engine to refuse. Microsoft handed that data right over.
Microsoft has ad campaigns suggesting Google employees are actively reading your email, even though they know that is an outright lie, the very definition of FUD.
Even worse, Microsoft is a hypocrite because they scan your email to serve up contextual ads as well.
Microsoft also has a patent on selling your private data to the highest bidder.
Google isn't giving your private data to anyone. They just serve you ads. Microsoft outright sells your data to people without your knowledge. And when they know they can't compete with Google on price, their only response is FUD.
http://rt.com/usa/yahoo-microsoft-campaign-political-862/
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Word is fairly underpowered for professional writing, but if you were an accountant, you'd be hard-pressed to find a replacement to Excel.
Microsoft Office's professional products are more Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, and Access. Word is just something to round out their offerings, an easy-to-use, amateurish but sufficiently featureful product that'll get their foot in the door.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
I couldn't find anything recent, but this has a summary: http://arstechnica.com/business/2011/10/google-apps-hasnt-met-lapds-security-requirements-city-demands-refund/
It also appears that consumerwatchdog.org may have been hired by Microsoft to attack Google: http://techrights.org/2009/05/04/consumer-watchdog-exposed/