Microsoft Office Web Review

Microsoft is planning to release a competitor to Google Docs and Zoho alongside its Office 2010 package called Microsoft Office Online. As more and more content moves to what is called 'the cloud' – i.e. documents being made and shared online rather than using software on your computer, it makes sense for Microsoft to catch up with the trend but the question is will it actually be any good?

Microsoft too profit hungry?

According to WebWorkersDaily, surprise, surprise Microsoft is planning to have the best of both worlds by withholding many of the features charging the businesses for the full package both for licensing and server costs.

It seems the online Microsoft Office 2010 release may not be much competition for Google Docs and Zoho if Microsoft withholds a lot of functionality to 'free' users. Then again so many people have 'Live' accounts and use Microsoft Word on there computers, easy integration and brand loyalty may just give Microsoft a default advantage.

It will be interesting to see how Google Docs and Zoho will respond to this competitor. Will they release a lot of new features before Microsoft Online Office is made available? Or will they sit back and see how it goes?

Microsoft Office Online - Hit, Miss or Maybe

The verdict for Office Online : Maybe!

The future of 'the cloud'?

So what does the future hold? As more and more people use online applications to create, store and share documents we could see a move away from computer based software. Lighter and possibly cheaper computers could come out with little storage space in the hardware as most storage will be on-line, in 'the cloud'.

This will lead to new privacy challenges with companies potentially having access to all of your documents. It will also be a security challenge, will hackers be able to get to your documents easily? Will it also open up the chance to incorporate advertising within documents? Who knows? Depending on your perspective this could be a good or bad thing.

Whatever your viewpoint watch out for the growth of 'the cloud' and let me know what you think about it in the comments section.