Submitted by “Microsoft’s next version of its small-business/home productivity suite, due imminently, will be free and ad-funded. Microsoft Works 9.0 – which will be the new product’s name, if Microsoft opts to stick with its current nomenclature – might also debut at some point as Microsoft-hosted low-end productivity service, as many have been speculating. A hosted version of Works would give Microsoft a head-to-head competitor with Google Docs & Spreadsheets and other consumer- and small-business focused services, analysts have said.”
Nice, but to bad MS Works is a PoS.
…none.
Hah!
What a joke, Works is little more than a launcher for office apps, it barely deserves to live!
–The loon
How can something be free (as in beer) and ad-funded at the same time? If I have to put up with ads in order to use the product, it is no longer free.
Anyway, I’m not sure MS Works has what it takes to go head-to-head with OpenOffice, even if it was completely free.
Edited 2007-08-01 00:29
I’m not sure that your logic is right. If something is free, it means that you don’t have to pay to get it. The fact that it also comes with adverts does not change this.
That’s only free as in beer then. Never heard of the distinction between adware and freeware??
Edited 2007-08-01 03:19
But this isn’t being provided as “freeware”. In the general sense, people regard free-to-air television as free, even though they sit through the paid advertisements.
To the end user, this is free regardless of whom and how it is funded by advertising.
An FOSS application can also be released as adware as well, and still stay within both “beer” and “(American) freedom” definitions.
I mean technically, Firefox is kinda like that: its free, but the devs get paid by Google for having them in the FF search bar (by default, nonetheless); the search bar leads to the search page, with has text ads on the side.
So, pretty much, Firefox is just severely-downplayed adware, as is Safari and Opera (also Google search by default, and they get paid, too).
I don’t think I want to know what you’re smokin’. Including the possibility to use a third party app/tool that, when used, also displays ads, is far from an app/tool that, when used, displays apps.
Anyway, as others above also stated, it doesn’t really matter how Works works
I mean, being in IT and all, I do not know even one person, who uses Works. Even when it comes with a laptop or something, everyone just uninstalls it. It’s just an annoyance. Adware or not, doesn’t matter.
What it’s being adware will be good for MS, is that they will have a chance to test the ad-based model before taking it further to Office and Windows. I personally think that if they don’t include the option to buy a version without the ad engine (not just disabled, but excluded), it will be doomed to fail.
That makes no sense.
You use Firefox, you search Google through Firefox. Google makes money from you searching them (through their ADS), Firefox makes money everytime Google, with its ads, is searched through its toolbar.
Unless you’re saying that Google is an adware app in itself, which, I think, is more correct than my assertion on Firefox.
Anyway, I’m not sure MS Works has what it takes to go head-to-head with OpenOffice, even if it was completely free.
Even if MS Works were superior (don’t know–never used it), I’m wondering if the ads will be annoying enough to cause some serious Windows users to think about alternatives.
Even if MS Works were superior (don’t know–never used it), I’m wondering if the ads will be annoying enough to cause some serious Windows users to think about alternatives.
Serious Windows users (power users) are already using MS Office.
Well gosh, why bother making a product if no one seriously uses it?
I’m confused.. you don’t have to click on the ads so I’m not sure how you’re paying for anything.
“If I have to put up with ads in order to use the product, it is no longer free.”
What do you think is funding Google Docs/Spreadsheet?
It doesn’t matter what is “funding” it. What matters [for a user] is whether you as a user are bothered with ads while using it, or not.
It doesn’t matter. It’s still free. I suggest someone here obtains a dictionary.
>> It doesn’t matter. It’s still free.
you pay with your attention to banners.
you pay indirectly when you buy these products.
So, obviously, adware is not freeware
It’s what I learned how to use in school (Works Database), and I actually liked its spreadsheet-style view. I’ve used similar databases in the past (I think AppleWorks had something similar), but these days I can’t find anything like it.
I don’t need anything fancy, just something like what Works had, yet there appears to be *nothing* like it… even for Windows. OpenOffice’s database (to me) is no good, and neither is Microsoft Office’s database.
Then again, I could probably just as easily blame the school system for teaching me **** I can’t use in the future (ie. NOW), as it’s long been replaced by some other kind of database.
Edited 2007-08-01 00:36
i guess it seems i am hte only one that liked Works from the sound of it. it was fast, responsive, and had the featuers i needed. at the time when 8.0 was out OO was to bloated and slow and MS office cost to much. it was between works and AbiWord. MS works and MS money were ok by me.
What’s always been confusing to me is why Microsoft would publish both Works and Office, when it seems they both seem like two ways to do the same thing.
Ah well. Maybe they would have had something by merging the lines. But now, Microsoft Works is going to go the same place all ad-supported software has gone: nowhere.
“What’s always been confusing to me is why Microsoft would publish both Works and Office, when it seems they both seem like two ways to do the same thing.”
so they can spend more money making the same product look like 2 different products so they can hopefully profit more. that way, they have the WHOLE market of word processors covered.
[OT]
“Score: 6”
I’m seeing lots of mods above 5 now, and all of a sudden I have 50 (!!!) mod votes? I didn’t see any announcements about these changes…anyone care to clue me in?
Go to the conversations area on v4 to see the announcement. Basically, they’ve decided to lift the caps on comment votes. You, apparently, said something that was voted on 50 times.
Fantastic, thanks for the info. Let the mayhem commence!
Now back to your regularly scheduled thread.
microsoft works is very crippled. for example, you can’t set the linespacing to 1.25 only 1.5 and 2.0. there are other stupid limitations as well.
adding ads to microsoft works would only annoy me more, so I’ll keep using the 2003 version of office.
why put up with adware, when you have open office?
Works for a lot of Windows apps so apparently quite a few people put up with it.
Edited 2007-08-01 03:40
As MSN on Windows, it’s free but has adverts. If ad based application are “innovative ways to provide the best productivity tools to our customers” then Microsoft need to look at the word innovative in the proper way.
Ad based apps are horrible, the last thing you want is to be distracted by ads.
I don’t get why ad-supported software is so maligned, considering that the developers have to find a way for the software to pay for itself. The OpenOffice folks shouldn’t talk about it, considering that Sun is the primary bankroller for their very existence (and that Sun sells a repackaged, barely-modified version of OpenOffice for enterprise users). Don’t be so hasty to criticize.
It’s all about how its done. Opera’s adware was placed at the most prominent places, and no one cared for that so they did away with it (now they’re bankrolled by Google and Nintendo). AIM’s adware was installed as a separate .exe (Viewpoint), something that pissed off a number of users. Yahoo, however, got it right: they placed the ads at the bottom of their IM, which would be less than noticeable and more integrated into the UI (since everyone’s reading from the top anyway).
If the ads are placed at the least conspicuous place, and the relationship with the ad media is not made especially outstanding, then Works just might pay for itself.
The only reason why I didn’t like Works was because documents made by Works were not compatible with Word (which I found out almost too late at my private school graduation…thankfully, I did well with a last-minute impromptu speech).
Edited 2007-08-01 01:45
MS Works? *grins*
The adware model in its simplest manifestation is easily contravened by denying the application the network access it needs to download new ads (any competent firewall has this capability). This might cause problems if, say, the program is a p2p application, but there’s no inherent reason that a word processor needs internet access. One can then simply find where the ads are stored and delete them. If the application is programmed not to function without them, it’s simple enough to just leave placeholder images there that are the same color as the interface. All this could be accomplished automatically by a very rudimentary utility, so the effort only needs to be invested once.
If Microsoft really plans to make this an important part of its business strategy, they must expect that either the ads will not be sufficiently annoying to motivate such measures or else they have some kind of countermeasure in mind. Could this be another arms race in the making like the one against DRM designers and DRM busters? As long as the computer is in the control of it’s users, it seems futile for MS. Microsoft of course realizes this, so they’re trying incrementally to divest computer users of control over their own machines. It has often been pondered what Microsoft has to gain by working with “content providers” to incorporate DRM into the core of the operating system, and now we see one of the many advantages of their designs beginning to become apparent. MS Works is not a core business asset, so it would not be at all surprising if they’re trying an experimental strategy on it that could conceivably be expanded to other product lines, or even to the OS itself.
Edited 2007-08-01 03:32
I’m sorry, but since when did DRM get into this?
Edited 2007-08-01 05:35
The adware model in its simplest manifestation is easily contravened by denying the application the network access it needs to download new ads (any competent firewall has this capability). This might cause problems if, say, the program is a p2p application, but there’s no inherent reason that a word processor needs internet access. One can then simply find where the ads are stored and delete them. If the application is programmed not to function without them, it’s simple enough to just leave placeholder images there that are the same color as the interface. All this could be accomplished automatically by a very rudimentary utility, so the effort only needs to be invested once.
Still, that’s a lot of effort when you can just download OpenOffice and have more features without the ads for free.
works is very lightweight and OO.o is a huge resource hog. its like comparing koffice with oo.o, it can do 90% of what people want twice as quickly.
“Microsoft Works To Become Free, Spyware-Funded Product”
I use MS Works but I am not connected to the internet? Does it have static ads?
Maybe Microsoft should stick adverts in BSODs and the message boxes that popup when tasks stop responding to subsidise the cost of Windows.
Someone will hack the ads out of the program eventually and you won’t have to deal with it anyway. It always happens.
There are many options out there, and you must find the best for you. In my opinnion, Office is the standard (even if you don't like it)But it is slow, and bloated (at least for me). Oo is a good alternative for MS office, but have the same problems, want to be as complete and have all the features posible, and when all you want is to write a letter, or an school work, you don't need all those things. Works, is a good suite, is cheap, not so resource hungry, and does well most of the things you want. Problems with it… Well, it have a propietary format, so it is not as user friendly as it must be (did somebody tried to give a works document to a friend/teacher/sister…?)
My Two cents? there are so many word processors around, so use what you need. I actually, downloaded the ppt viewer from MS (i don't do presentations) and use Atlantis as my word processor (light, fast, cheap and have all the features i need)