Microsoft Works going free online poses dilemma

Stan Beer
Saturday, 23 September 2006 10:17

Opinion and Analysis

The general manager of Microsoft Information Worker Business Strategy, Alan Yates, told iTWire earlier this year that the company's Office 2007 software is 10 years ahead of the opposition in the open source world.

• Announcements

Yesterday, Yates told Reuters that to entice low-end users Microsoft was considering adopting "new business models like advertising and other payment models, as well as new forms of distribution."

The latest statements from Yates are an acknowledgement that Microsoft sees trouble ahead and wants to head it off at the pass. However, putting Works online is a half-hearted temporary solution at best.

Right now, online office tools like Writely and Google Speadsheets are very basic compared to the rich feature set provided by Word and Excel. However, they already kill the Microsoft desktop products for collaborative projects and other features will be added progressively to bring them up to the level of their desktop equivalents.