"...cloud-based services with on-premise apps..."
A premise in an assumption. These clowns crack me up.
Microsoft has accused Google of behaving like Microsoft. Back in 2007, Redmond bet its web future on what it likes to call "software plus services" - the notion that web applications are best used in tandem with clientware installed on your local PC. And for the past two and a half years, this has remained the Redmond mantra …
Well, since Microsoft so famously declared the Internet "irrelevant", back when Gates was still considered as a visionary, its no surprise that Google, which is responsible in part for the way things are on the Internet today, would take advantage of its position and create its own environment.
The Internet is the one realm where Microsoft consistently fails. None of its many attempts to gain supremacy have managed to thoroughly extinguish its rivals. Now Google is coming along with its own tools. Combined with its reputation and market share, Google is certainly capable of making Microsoft quake in its boots.
And quake Microsoft will, because the Internet is a domain where the usual scare tactics don't work. Microsoft can pressure OEMs, distributors and whatever else, but ISPs are immune to its shenanigans. All that exists on the Internet are the users and Microsoft, unlike the RIAA and MPAA, is not dumb enough to try and scare the people who pay it.
"They're just solving age-old problems like online-offline sync and taking things running in a browser frame and giving them access to local system resources in a secure way... These are problems that have already been solved in Windows - and Mac OS for that matter - and they're just being re-solved all over again."
MacOS yeah... Windows... ahem... secure?
I'm talking about ChromeOS.
Then again, I use Windows because I need some software that only runs on Windows. (Unusual media players and assistive technology.) Take away that requirement - let software run on any client device - and I'll be very flexible.
My other concern is that if my PC breaks down then I can use another one, but if the cloud breaks then I'm stuck. Oh, and data in the cloud may be more available to hackers or to the secret police, for uses legitimate and other. For that matter you can bribe the police...
All hands on deck; Apple-blokey laying into Google, Microsoft laying into Google, governments laying into Google...
Some people define their success by how many people they piss off. Others realise and think "oh f...k!". Which camp will Google be in? Don't answer, rhetorical question.
Flame icon because the Google Kitchen is getting kinda hot.
What Google is doing is not even close to what Microsoft does.
Microsoft requires the purchase of very expensive software and then also wants to be paid for online services on top. Does Google do that? I do not think so.
Google may sell the Nexus One. But, it does not require Nexus One buyers to rent, lease or subscribe to additional Google services.
Microsoft may change. But how soon do you think the $500 office suite will be available without a stiff upfront fee. And, those cloud services are of no use unless you first cough up the $500.
Microsoft is scared that consumers will figure out that Microsoft does not need to be paid.
I worked at an ISP for a few months setting up new routers. About two weeks after they were installed, we had to get more since the first few were hitting about 90-95% usage. Putting even more load on our already over-stressed backbones is a huge mistake. Until someone comes up with a method of making the internet a hundred times faster without spending much, and making it %99.999 reliable wherever you go, then Desktop application will reign supreme, or at least local + web.