Office 365 meets Google Apps - but does the cloud always make sense for consumers?
Not too long ago, I attended a Google seminar on AdWords, Google’s auction-based system for keywords to get you up at the top of their search results. The organization leading the seminar first did a “Google 101” before the AdWords portion of the seminar. This included a quick overview of Google Apps, touted as free while you have to pay for Microsoft Office.
While sometime it sounds like the cloud is going to usher in world peace, I have to be skeptical at times. Don’t get me wrong; I see a lot of benefits from cloud computing. But using the cloud means you have to be able to access it! This isn’t generally an issue for businesses that have robust networking environments, typically with redundancy engineered in. My concern is for those areas/consumers that don’t have good (that means “fast”) or reliable Internet connectivity.
For those of us living in large metropolitan areas, we forget not everyone has high speed Internet access they can rely on, or 4G/3G networks. Rural areas and vacation spots often don’t – some don’t even have a cell phone tower in range! Even if you’re not “in the boonies,” DSL and cable modems can have their drawbacks. In the past two days, even in the heart of suburbia its been necessary to recycle my modem and router several times to regain Internet access.
Back to Google Apps. I asked the instructor if using Google Apps required decent connectivity rather than dial-up. He snickered that no one uses dial-up anymore. This actually got a reaction from several in the audience that have to rely on dialup when they’re going out to the lake (or similar environs) for long weekends during the summer. Then there’s the question about when you’re traveling and don’t have Internet access on the plane. Well, you can always work offline and upload later. That’s fine when you know you’re not going to have access. However, when that router or modem goes down, that’s not something you’ve planned for.
Microsoft obviously thinks the market Google Apps wants to reach is worth going after, hence the introduction of Office 365, which according to CRN’s Edward Moltzen is far superior to Google’s product. In his words: “Office 365, frankly, is to Google Apps as XBOX 360 Live is to Pong. It’s in a different league entirely and represents a leap into the next generation of computing” (see https://www.crn.com/news/cloud/229401751/first-look-microsofts-office-365-will-shake-up-it.htm).
That’s definitely a big claim for an office productivity suite. And improvements in office productivity suites are great. I just hope someone remembers that not everyone can access the cloud all of the time.
