Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.
At the time, iTWire's Stan Beer observed "A major problem for Microsoft is figuring out how to offer free software using the advertising supported model without jeopardizing its legacy paid software business. Microsoft knows there’s a lot of money in ads but the company already makes US$16.4 billion a year selling software.
"However, steady improvement in free online software such as Google Docs and Spreadsheets, coupled with the availability of free open source productivity suites, such as OpenOffice.org, may leave Microsoft no choice but to come up with its own free software model. Such a model would eventually have to include Office rather than just Works in order to compete with other free software products already on offer", Beer wrote.
An interesting twist to the model is that Office Starter 2010 will be upgradable to one of the three full versions of the suite (Office Home & Student 2010, Office Home & Business 2010, or Office Professional 2010).
The trick is that the full Office product will be pre-loaded on the PCs. All users will need to do to activate full functionality is purchase a product key card - which will be packaged like a gift card and sold through major electronic retailers - and type the key into the software.
For potential Office 2010 users that aren't buying a new PC, Microsoft will use its virtualisation technology to allow the use of a downloadable trial version alongside earlier versions of Office. This 'Click-to-Run' technology will also automatically download and install any software patches for Office.
A public beta of Office 2010 is expected before the end of the year.
David Bass
| ComOps, a leading Australian provider of business software products and services, has won a competitive tender to deploy its Salvus safety, r…
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