I posted on Sunday under Tech Predictions that within 5 years there will be a free Web Based Microsoft office.

See that Post Here

I wasn’t too far off the mark, Microsoft announced yesterday its coming in 2006.

From the Announcement

Microsoft Office Live is coming.
Today, an online presence is almost a requirement for small business success. That’s why Microsoft is introducing Microsoft® Office Live—a set of affordable business productivity services designed to help you grow your business more easily by establishing a professional presence online.

Microsoft Office Live will provide your company with its own domain name, Web site, and e-mail accounts for free.

Additionally, Microsoft Office Live will offer you and your employees expert business management applications, such as customer, project, and document management tools, and a security-enhanced private Web site—affordably managed and maintained by Microsoft—where you can work together and share information with your employees, customers, suppliers, and contractors.

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Basically this will be a free service that is sponsored by targeted advertising, just like gmail/hotmail have.

Announcing something thats free and coming in 2006 is just to ward off the impending threat from Google/Sun’s free web Based Office.
See Post Here

I would like to point out that Microsoft Office retails for more than £300, providing a free derivative can only stimulate interest in other free solutions or worse eat into Microsoft’s existing Office Business.

All I can tell you is by 2010 when the “free” war has been won, the software world is going to be a much different place.

News Link

http://www.zdnet.com.au/

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 2nd, 2005 at 9:27 am and is filed under Microsoft Live.com. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.