As Google Docs rolls out the updates we wrote about in April, Microsoft Office 2010 is hogging the limelight. And just last week Microsoft released Office Web Apps . It may seem like Microsoft is encroaching on Google’s territory, but Google doesn’t have much territory to defend. Sponsor According to Forrester , only 4% of U.S. online consumers use Google Docs. “In terms of usage and penetration, Google Docs remains a failure,” wrote JP Gownder for Forrester. Office Web Apps won’t kill Google Docs; Google Docs was never really alive to begin with. Google’s hopes seem to lay in converting enterprises to their offerings as awareness and demand for cloud-based solutions increases. But Microsoft is taking the cloud very seriously. The company’s hiring 500 sales people just to push the cloud. And it has what appears to be an impenetrable lead in the office software market. But Google Docs still leads Office Web Apps in features, and if Google can patch some of its weaknesses and exploit some of Microsoft’s, it still stands a chance to make a respectable showing in the enterprise. Offline Access Google dropped Google Gears support last month, and hasn’t announced when its new HTML5 based offline solution will be released. As nice as having access to documents in the cloud is, having access to mission-critical documents when your Internet connection is down or you’re in a wireless dead-zone is even better. Sure, there have been third-party apps to sync your files, and you can export and save them to your computer. But a seamless offline Google experience would be even better. By creating a Google-approved syncing solution, the partnership with Memeo to create the Gdrive is a step in this direction. Memeo Connect will sync Google Docs with a documents on a user’s local computer, but they’ll still need to fire up Microsoft Office or Open Office to edit them offline. However, it puts Google Docs into the position of being a reasonable competitor to Office Web Apps, even for Office 2010 users. Mobile Editing Office Web Apps documents can be accessed from mobile devices, but they’re read-only. Google’s been offering limited editing in Google Docs for some time now. Microsoft will doubtlessly incorporate Web Apps editing through Windows Mobile 7, and possibly other devices, so Google needs to expand its lead in this area. Pricing Danny Sulivan writes that he might skip this version of Office because Microsoft isn’t offering an upgrade discount. The lack of upgrade pricing is effectively a price-hike. It’s one thing to ask a company to keep paying for something they’ve always paid for. It’s another to ask them to start paying more . Google should take advantage of this. Collaboration The most significant improvement in the Google Docs update is the Wave-like real-time collaborative editing feature. Although Office Web Apps already has some collaborative editing functionality, it’s severely crippled in that users can’t actually see each others edit in real-time. It’s not clear just how great an advantage this will be, but Google should milk it for all it’s worth. Google Chrome Microsoft maintains its marketshare in part by bundling Office with consumer PCs. Google Chrome could introduce a number of customers to Google Docs if netbooks, tablets or even desktops powered by the OS take off. Portable Chrome devices with offline access to Google Docs and GDrive syncing could compliment desktops running Office – a first step towards supplanting Office completely. Of course, offering complete Chrome and Google Apps solutions for enterprise desktops as well as portable devices would be far more interesting. We’ve speculated that Google might be planning to market Chrome to the enterprise in the past. Discuss

Click here to read more

Future, we are here. With today’s launch of the Sprint HTC EVO 4G , the hotly anticipated smartphone running Google’s Android OS, video chatting moves off the desktop and into the palm of your hand. Using the popular Qik mobile application , EVO owners will be able to chat with other EVO owners and, eventually, with any smartphone user whose phone sports a forward-facing camera. Are we on the precipice of a whole new form of communication? Or is mobile video chat going to be just for fun? Sponsor Qik for EVO: Free Chat or Premium Features Qik is not the first company to launch video chat, neither here in the U.S. nor overseas, where similar services have been available for some time. On Windows Mobile, for example, niche solutions like iVisit and camfrog are available now, but don’t kick yourself for not knowing they existed. In the U.S. at least, no large video chat brand has ever attempted to do what Qik is doing now – launch a consumer-friendly video chat service on this scale. Oh, and it’s free, too. Pre-launch, there was some confusion as to whether Qik would be yet another nickel-and-dimed upgrade from Sprint, when leaked news seemed to point to a $5/month upgrade for its use, but now that the service has officially arrived, we at last have full details on what’s free and what’s not. The $5/month upgrade plan brings EVO users additional, premium features, but most can get by with the basic, free service without any issues. A comparison chart on Qik’s website highlights all the differences between the two plans, but the most notable valued-added features include video conferencing at higher video resolutions, unlimited video archiving, specialized video access permissions and “priority” support. In other words, this package is aimed squarely at business users whose needs will be greater than the everyday consumer. The premium features will be offered to all new users until July 15th, at which point the upcharge will kick in if you want to keep the premium service. Another interesting feature available in the new Qik for EVO application is its “video mail” capabilities. If you want to send a video to a non-Qik user, you can send it out as an SMS message. This isn’t just a useful feature for unshackling video communications from being limited just to EVO handsets, but it also has the benefit of raising awareness about mobile video chatting services in general. Every SMS video message sent is like an ad for Qik…or maybe for EVO itself. Beyond Qik: Skype, Fring, More? Video chatting won’t be limited to Qik/EVO pairings, though. If the stolen iPhone prototype is any indication, the upcoming iPhone 4G will include a front-facing camera as well and likely a mobile version of Apple’s iChat to take advantage of the feature. Fring is another up-and-coming company which began offering mobile video calls late last year on various Nokia devices. They’re now doing the same on all capable Android phones – in fact, they even beat Qik to the punch by a matter of days. And of course, there’s Skype , the grand-daddy of video chat solutions, who is launching an Android app later this year. Although Skype won’t officially say whether a mobile video calling feature will be included, an accidental blurb released from Skype PR seemed to confirm the company’s plans in that area. (” We intend to set the bar on mobile video calling, and it’s something we’re going to do this year,” a spokesperson had said before they took it back.) Are we on the verge of a mobile video chat revolution? It appears so. How useful will these types of service be? Time will tell, but our guess is: very. Video chatting is already popular on the desktop and laptop, both for business and personal use. Remote workers, virtual teams, work-from-home staff, helpdesk professionals and others take advantage of video chat capabilities while at work and individuals use it to connect with families and friends when far from home, too. Now with mobile video chat, the opportunity to reach another segment of the market – those whose primary “computer” is their mobile phone – is ripe. Not everyone slaves away behind a keyboard where traditional video chat programs reside. Now they don’t have to – mobile video chat brings this new avenue of communications to all owners of modern-day phones. Now if we could just get it on our wristwatch, we’d be all set. Discuss

Click here to read more

Yammer introduced today its Microsoft Sharepoint Web Part, which integrates Yammer with Sharepoint. Using the Web Part, available for Windows SharePoint Server 2007 or Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS), Yammer users will now be able to put a Yammer feed on “virtually any SharePoint page” and post to Yammer from different areas within Sharepoint. MOSS users will be able to view Yammer messages alongside Sharepoint search results. Sponsor Yammer, to our surprise , has gained traction in the enterprise. In November it announced that it had 50,000 networks up and running (but how many of those are paid account we don’t know). Yammer released a Microsoft Outlook plugin and a Windows Mobile app in September. Having brought its service into the dominant enterprise e-mail application, Sharepoint integration was a logical next move. Yammer says Sharepoint 2010 integration is in development and will be available this summer. Socialcast , Socialtext Signals , Obayoo and status.net compete with Yammer in the enterprise microblogging market. Discuss

Click here to read more

Nielsen , the ratings and measurement company, has just announced the sale of something it is calling its App Playbook , built after surveying over 4,200 people who had downloaded a mobile application in the preceding 30 days. Perhaps surprising isn’t the word for the conclusions they’ve published, since there is not a lot of data preceding it. But interesting it definitely is. 21% of American wireless subscribers have a smart phone at Q4 2009, up from 19% in the previous quarter and significantly higher than the 14% at the end of 2008 14% of mobile subscribers have downloaded an app in the last 30 days Average number of apps: Smart phone: 22, Feature phone: 10 Sponsor The phones that users have downloaded the most apps to were, in order, iPhone, with 37; Android, 22; Palm, 14; Windows Mobile, 13 and BlackBerry, 10. Among other conclusions of the survey is that games, both free and paid, are the most downloaded of apps. No surprise there. On smart phones, vs. feature phones, the most popular are Facebook, Google Maps and Weather Channel. Facebook is also the most popular in the social app category, but LinkedIn is popular with adults 25-44 and MySpace is more popular with teens than one might expect , given its leveling off. The greatest surprise is that news barely makes a ding in the apps market, at least according to this study. Getting news tailored to your needs is one of the most gratifying elements of the new world of information. But maybe we’re somewhat prejudiced . Discuss

Click here to read more

McAfee , the computer security firm, announced that it is buying Trust Digital , a smartphone management and security software company. McAfee, which has nearly $2 billion per year in sales, is hoping the acquisition of Trust Digital will allow it to present a total security loop, from endpoint, McAfee’s speciality, through a company’s smartphones, and back again. Sponsor Trust Digital helps “secure and manage corporate smartphones and PDAs” worldwide. They are global leader, though they have only about 40 employees to McAfee’s 6,000. Trust Digital’s offerings support iPhone OS, Android, Web OS, Windows Mobile, and Symbian mobile operating systems. McAfee expects to mesh these with its ePolicy Orchestrator , its “enterprise-class, open platform to centrally manage security for systems, networks, data, and compliance solutions.” The companies expect the deal to close by June 30. Discuss

Click here to read more