Microsoft Cloud Strategy

Microsoft own the OS and Office Market, no doubt of that, but to maintain this status they have to provide solutions on the cloud. Actually, Microsoft have already solutions in the cloud, they have Exchange and Share Point for the Enterprise, which are pretty much the standard in synchronization right now, they also have the Office live thingy but like many things from Microsoft is hard to see where is the benefit we can get using it, cause is buried under a lot of Marketing and unrelated stuff that -at least for me- is not working.

The next evolutionary step for Microsoft is migrate their Office suite to the cloud, that’s when Silverlight come to play. last year release of Silverlight was toke with a lot of skepticism from the community, the purpose was not so clear to the majority of us. I saw Silverlight like a “me too” project to compete with Adobe and the ubiquitous Flash Player -thanks to video for that penetration numbers. But looking more closely to the last steps from Microsoft, like the partnership to broadcast video from the next olympiads on the net, that will surely rocket the Silverlight penetration numbers.

With a Silverlight in the ~98% of the computers connected to the cloud -like Flash player is right now, Microsoft will be ready to roll out an Office Suite in the platform ready to be used from the cloud. That may be Microsoft’s master plan right now… or something similar. But surely they have a plan to deploy Office to the Cloud.

Google Cloud Strategy

Google is native to the cloud, they where born in the cloud. In the last years Google was unveiling a set of services, starting with Google Mail, Calendar, Documents, Reader and a long etcetera. Starting to make the transition to the cloud their most successful services in that set are GMail, Calendar and Reader. They are also taking steps to make this products easy to use for collaboration which is other hot trend in cloud computing.

Their strategies to take over the cloud are simple, offer a better service (anyone is using hotmail out there?) and the APIs. Let’s take a look at the APIs and why they are important. The APIs from Google services provide a way to migrate this services to other platforms and uses depending of specific requirements, for instance I can sync my GMail and Calendar on my iPhone using 3rd party applications for the iPhone who rely on the Google APIs. Also Google don’t have to worry about make this applications cause the community is empowered to do it.

Next evolutionary step is: mobile, and here is where Android is invited to the game. I’m very sceptic about Android -mostly cause I hate Java- but I’m sure that Android play really important role in the Google’s master plan. Of course we still have to wait for the first device loaded with Android -hey HTC where is your Android ready device for this month? you are late already.

Google set of service are starting to take off mainly on small teams and companies, but there is a long way to go for Google Documents, cause everybody at work have Outlook, Word, Excel and Powerpoint already.

Apple cloud strategy

Apple unveiled the iPhone 3G this week and at the same time they present a new service: Mobile Me, which will sync your email, calendar, photos and files across the Macs, the PCs and your phone -if you have an iPhone. That’s a step into cloud computing. Is a paid service -is Apple- but surely will solve the sync problem.

This is a interesting approach cause Apple is not a big player on Internet Services, but I’m sure that the user experience on the service will win a lot of customers to the service. The people will love the fact that is 0 hassle involve on the configuration and synchronization of this service with you computers at home, work and your phone.

With this approach Apple will be quietly gaining some terrain on the SaaS market and will be easy to plug in more services on Mobile Me later -a Office Suite, maybe

Adobe Cloud strategy

Adobe on their site have their Flash Player installed on a big percent of the computers connected to the net and lately with the launch of the AIR platform will be very easy to deploy many hosted serviced on the net.

Adobe have already a Word Processor built on Flex, Buzzword and currently integrated on their Acrobat.com service. Buzzword is by far the best Word Processor you can use right now on the net; also is native to the net so the collaboration features are really nice.

They are rumors Adobe is developing a office suite which include Spreadsheets and Presentations software but this are only rumors right now.

Other players in the field

You have probably heard or use some of the other services and applications in the cloud computing field: SalesForce, Zoho, ThinkFree, 37signals products, etc. This is a hot field and every want a piece of the cloud pie here, let’s see who win this race.

Keep flowing.

Let’s go in parts, in your email you have all the addresses of people you communicate and interact, right? Also there is in a way how important are these people to you and what you do with them. The email is the next frontier for social networking. Who will win in these race (that is not even started), the email services providers like Microsoft (Hotmail, now Live Mail), Yahoo (Y! Mail) and Google (GMail), these are the 3 major players in the email service market. They are actually trying to take advantage of this, releasing features that interact with the social graph that reside quietly on your inbox.

Now, your phone, yes in your phone is a more intimate social graph, but almost no one is getting in to it. You remember the migration from your last phone to the new one, was a pain right? But once the pals at DataPortability get thing a little bit further all your data can flow limitless anywhere you allow it to go (hopefully).

That will be a huge step in the social part of our daily activities cause your social graph will be not only people you are never seen or even talked on the phone but people that you interact with, in a daily basis.

What is the key? Communication! What you need a cell phone in the first place? Mainly to be available to any new information that your social graph generate, no matter what is, a SMS, a phone call, an email and lately a twitt or a pownce. This information come to you and mostly flow back to your social graph modified by you. All this interactions occur without been noticed, but is interesting once you start to watch it, from a little distance.

The future of Social Network and how interact with your social graph is not in FaceBook or MySpace, is you pocket, more exactly in your cell phone. And is likely to wait for the next generation of applications taking advantage of this, let’s not call it social applications cause the term is just overused.

Keep flowing.

A bit of history

In the beginning, there was Wordstar and Supercalc for the old MS-DOS, next come Corel WordPerfect and Quattro Pro, then, Microsoft Office for Windows came and the party is almost over.

Is no secret that one of the most used programs today is for Office purposes, things like typing reports, expenses plans, or sales presentations is just as common as drink coffee in any office now days.

Online Office

First of all I don´t want to wait 1 minute to open and seek a document, next, the lack of features. But all is not that bad. For example Buzzword (recently acquired by Adobe) is by far the best Online Word Processor out there, is simple, quick, nice designed, intuitive UI/UX, and with Flex there is just better that all the AJAX mumbo jumbo present in the other applications (Google Docs, I am talking about you).

Online Office software have a key to success that is (starting now check Office Live from Microsoft) not very common in Desktop Office Software, and that is, Collaboration, yes collaboration.

With Online Office apps maybe we can finally be free from the hassle of never ending attaching versions of documents to our email (is almost as the old chain letters). And improve the way we work with others.

Let´s say the true here: Who use Google Docs or Buzzword for every day documents creations? The answer is: not many. Why? Because is hard to get thing the way you want in the on Online Office applications.

Offline Office

Desktop Office Software have all the features and speed of… well… desktop applications. And even when the good ones are expensive, you always can get OpenOffice or Lotus Symphony for free.

I (and you too, certainly) still prefer use a desktop application for my daily office work, is just way easy to click on a document file, open it and start editing. No web application can beat that, and we are used to it.

Finally

The Desktop Office Software will be here with us for long time, maybe because people are used to it or the lack of features in Online applications. But something is true, Online Applications have the Collaboration thing that can, in the long way, win the race.

Keep flowing.