Microsoft

Office for iOS goes free and adds integration with Dropbox

That was fast. Only on 4th November we wrote that Dropbox had partnered with Microsoft. 

Today Microsoft updated its Office for iOS apps with Dropbox integration. What is surprising, is the fact that Microsoft made Office for iOS free for the majority of users (i.e. people who doesn’t need some ).

Office for iPad, launched this past March required an Office 365 subscription in order to edit files. Office for iPhone, on the other hand was free and allowed creating documents too. Today’s move represents a strategy change for Microsoft, the second in eight months. 

I cannot disagree with Six Colors, when it says that this appears like a desperation move:

Because Microsoft’s shifted from a strategy of “if you want to use our apps, you have to pay for a subscription” to “okay, you can use most of the common features for free, but we hope you’ll upgrade for fancier features.” Clearly, Redmond’s hoping that first, free taste will be enough to get you hooked. Then again, if Microsoft’s subscription strategy was succeeding, it wouldn’t be making this change.

The point is that all companies these days fight for customer retention. Whereas Apple has superb hardware and an allure of affordable luxury, and Google can offer exceptional web services, Microsoft has got just nothing. 

No private customer has any incentive to live in the Microsoft ecosystem. Efforts like OneDrive and Office for iOS seem too little, too late. 

Dropbox partnering with Microsoft

Smart move by :

That’s why we’re partnering with Microsoft to help you do more on your phones, tablets, and the web. Soon you’ll be able to access your Dropbox directly from Office apps, and edit Office files from the Dropbox app.

I was afraid that Dropbox had lost its vision, but this partnership shows the opposite. Lots of users need to use Office, but love syncing their docs via Dropbox rather than OneDrive. 

Hats off to Microsoft too, for allowing a competitor in the document syncing business to work with their office suite. 

Google and Microsoft repeating Apple’s mistakes

Another excellent editorial by Daniel Eran Dilger. On Google:

Never mind that advertising on mobile is not working out like advertising on the desktop PC browser. Google’s ad profitability is dropping with each quarter, something that analysts like to excuse because “mobile ads work differently.” But a larger problem is that while the PC desktop is plateauing, Google’s control over the Android mobile platform is itself slipping.
While analysts are extremely concerned about Apple’s share of mobile growth, and in particular its growth in China, they are only making excuses about Google’s mobile performance and completely ignoring the fact that China has built its own version of Google services. 

and on Microsoft:

Microsoft is increasingly looking like a company with serious cracks opening in its facade, and within those cracks you can observe some very rotten stuff that will require very extensive surgery to remove.
One example: in addition to massive layoffs, Microsoft is also revealing that a significant portion of what it does is actually farmed out to non-employee vendor and temporary contractors, resulting in exposure of “Microsoft IP and confidential information.

Apple’s advantage in 2014 is that it’s already made all the mistakes that both Microsoft and Google are making twenty years ago. 

I must add that Apple’s advantage is the impressive capability to execute. 

Apple-Microsoft relationship at an all time high

Today’s announcement that Microsoft is releasing OneNote for Mac has caught me by surprise.

The surprise is about the timing and the fact that OneNote is available in the Mac App Store. The fact that Microsoft has released this software free of charge and only a few weeks after Satya Nadella was named its CEO says a lot about Apple-Microsoft good relationship.

With the release of OneNote for Mac, Microsoft acknowledges the importance of the Apple ecosystem for its own survival. Ignoring it would mean losing billions of dollars in potential revenue.

If Microsoft’s interest is clear, Apple’s is more subtle. Apple is not publicly declaring its love for Microsoft, but the signs are all there. Apple’s problem is Google, which incidentally is the same problem that Microsoft has. By joining forces with Microsoft, and its foothold in the enterprise market, Apple can slow down Google’s rise.

Speaking about apps, it’s curious that both OneNote and more notably OneDrive are distributed via the Mac App Store. This is a sign that the two companies are willing to put aside anachronistic rivalries and work together for their customers’ benefit.

For OneDrive in particular, it’s significant that it is the only file sync application distributed (allowed by Apple?) through this channel. Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, SugarSync and Amazon Drive are only available from the respective company websites.

This is not a small thing. It’s common knowledge that in order to add the little green checkmarks on the synced files, all these companies basically have to reverse-engineer the Finder. The fact that Apple turned a blind eye when Microsoft submitted OneDrive to the App Store says a lot about the good relationship between the two companies.

At this point, I would not be surprised to see Bing being replaced as the default search engine in iOS 8 and Microsoft Office for iPad being released very soon. For all its past deeds, Microsoft is still a reliable, powerful and knowledgeable software company. Having it on Apple’s side is a good thing.

On iWork 2013

I’ve been using the new Pages and Numbers, part of iWork, since release day.

To my surprise, I feel at home with this new version of the Apple’s office suite. Back in June when Apple integrated a beta version of iWork for iCloud.com, I told myself how nice it would be if I could have the same application structure in the native OS X software. It looks like I’ve been satisfied.

On the fact that the application lacks features that were present in iWork ’09, I think Apple is not intentionally dumbing down the software.

On the contrary, Apple is known – and not afraid – for starting from scratch if it makes technically sense. OS X was an example, Final Cut X was a more recent one. It is advantageous to be able to scrap the old, and often clunky code. The result is a new application with the right foundations for the future.

Apple has never been shy to throw away legacy code. Unlike Microsoft, for example.

Microsoft and Apple on tablets

The difference between Microsoft and Apple on tablets:

If your worldview of productivity is limited to what can be done on a PC – documents, spreadsheets, presentations, coding – then of course you will produce a product that is like a PC, but worse for having tablet features. Of course you’ll produce a Surface.

If, though, your worldview of productivity is defined not by the PC, but rather by people – by the liberal arts – then you will produce a product that is nothing like a PC, but rather an intimate, responsive object that invites people in, and transforms itself into whatever you need it to be.

You’ll produce an iPad.

Ben Thompson from Stratechery is one of the most insightful Apple writers. This  post is worth a read.

In a way it’s true that Apple now lacks a visionnaire, who tell the world the why of a certain product. It’s not that Apple lacks a product roadmap, but maybe more like a person who explain the world the reason for certain choices.

Microsoft caught lying in commercial

This is really sad.

Microsoft presents a series of four tablet devices running either Windows 8 or Windows RT, but the default comparison pits a full size 9.7 inch iPad against the 10.6 inch Asus VivoTab Smart.
However, as noted by blogger Elliot Temple of Curi.us, Microsoft’s comparison graphics are not to scale.

“Microsoft has drawn a 10.1 inch tablet 36% larger than a 9.7 inch tablet,” Temple wrote, pointing out that the iPad actually has a screen area of 45.16 square inches, while the Asus tablet is actually 3.5 percent smaller at 43.56 square inches, “not 36% more as Microsoft depicts.”

(Via Apple Insider)

Fight between Google and Microsoft over Youtube app

Arstechnica has a nice summary of the current fight between Google and Microsoft over the Youtube app for Windows mobile.

To make a long story short, a few days ago Microsoft released a Youtube app that doesn’t display any ads and allows users to download videos.

This is a paragraph of the letter Google sent Microsoft as an official complaint:

By blocking advertising and allowing downloads of videos, your application cuts off a valuable ongoing revenue source for creators and causes harm to the thriving content ecosystem on YouTube.

Microsoft response came yesterday, just after :

We’d be more than happy to include advertising but need Google to provide us access to the necessary APIs. In light of Larry Page’s comments today calling for more interoperability and less negativity, we look forward to solving this matter together for our mutual customers.

Arstechnica confirms that Xbox includes Google ads, which indicates that Microsoft would be willing to include them, as long as its developers have the code to be able to.

Bing’s privacy protection

Agressive and straightforward Microsoft page to convince users to switch to Bing as their default search engine.

Among the points Microsoft raises:

  1. Google promised it would not track Safari users.
  2. Google broke its promise and tracked Safari users without their permission.
  3. Google used this improperly obtained information to target ads for profit.
  4. The FTC took action against Google in the form of a record $22.5 million penalty.
Sounds familiar.

via .