Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Renting Software
As you guys know I've started blogging for work. Well Steve Rubel is the PR guru of blogging. Very interesting blog and from what I hear quite a nice guy.
Anyway, he brought up the topic of renting software. Specifically, he mentioned a company that is offering a home-grown, web-enabled version of the MSOffice suite.
Fear not dear reader, I wouldn't want you to exert your index finger more than is absolutely necessary. So forgive me Steve, but I'm posting my comments here as well.
Let me know how wrong or dare I say...right I am.
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Call me a curmudgeon. A man living in an on-demand world, mired in the idea of actual ownership.
I don't want to rent my software. I want to pay one fee and not have to think about it again. Between toll booth payment systems, online content subscriptions, and several utility bills, I have more than enough sources siphoning my bank account. Now, IÂm supposed to let software vendors in there as well? Perhaps for game software that has little to no replay value I would consider it, but a ubiquitous piece of coding like the MS Office suite, No thank you.
Also, what about when the Internet fails? Granted, stability has improved by leaps and bounds over the past few years, but there are still those times when either the network is so congested surfing becomes an exercise in frustration or you just flat out canÂt connect. Under this model:
No Internet=No Productivity.
No Thank You!
Anyway, he brought up the topic of renting software. Specifically, he mentioned a company that is offering a home-grown, web-enabled version of the MSOffice suite.
Fear not dear reader, I wouldn't want you to exert your index finger more than is absolutely necessary. So forgive me Steve, but I'm posting my comments here as well.
Let me know how wrong or dare I say...right I am.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Call me a curmudgeon. A man living in an on-demand world, mired in the idea of actual ownership.
I don't want to rent my software. I want to pay one fee and not have to think about it again. Between toll booth payment systems, online content subscriptions, and several utility bills, I have more than enough sources siphoning my bank account. Now, IÂm supposed to let software vendors in there as well? Perhaps for game software that has little to no replay value I would consider it, but a ubiquitous piece of coding like the MS Office suite, No thank you.
Also, what about when the Internet fails? Granted, stability has improved by leaps and bounds over the past few years, but there are still those times when either the network is so congested surfing becomes an exercise in frustration or you just flat out canÂt connect. Under this model:
No Internet=No Productivity.
No Thank You!
Comments:
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I know what you mean about no internet=no productivity. At our office we have a T1 connection for a handful of web servers hosting a handful of websites. Basically we have about a billion times more bandwidth than we need. We only have 2 employees, so our network demands are small.
Anyway, a couple of weeks ago our T1 provider descided that we no longer required internet. You see, we called up to have a simple superfluous phone line shut off, and they shut everything down. I won't name names, but it rhymes with Spallegiance Phelecom. Anyway, you'd be amazed at how little got done. In fact, 95% of the next four days were spent just trying to get our internet and phones back on. The miracles of modern technology!
Anyway, a couple of weeks ago our T1 provider descided that we no longer required internet. You see, we called up to have a simple superfluous phone line shut off, and they shut everything down. I won't name names, but it rhymes with Spallegiance Phelecom. Anyway, you'd be amazed at how little got done. In fact, 95% of the next four days were spent just trying to get our internet and phones back on. The miracles of modern technology!
Spaulding,
It took me a few days but I left comments on the realism of Batman post. Check it out. There's information as well as opinions.
It took me a few days but I left comments on the realism of Batman post. Check it out. There's information as well as opinions.
Do you see the potential in computing resources as a utility though?
Sure, we're not quite there yet, but give it some time and see how the productivity could go way up if we (I mean those users that aren't as swift) didn't have to spend all that time managing and maintaining our PC's and software.
Just another pipe that comes into the house or office like telephone and cable vision, the computing pipe which delivers the cycles and software to process those cycles.
An interesting book that talks a bit about this and the current state of IT is 'Does IT Matter' by Carr.
Sure, we're not quite there yet, but give it some time and see how the productivity could go way up if we (I mean those users that aren't as swift) didn't have to spend all that time managing and maintaining our PC's and software.
Just another pipe that comes into the house or office like telephone and cable vision, the computing pipe which delivers the cycles and software to process those cycles.
An interesting book that talks a bit about this and the current state of IT is 'Does IT Matter' by Carr.
# posted by 
: 7/19/2005 12:48 PM
: 7/19/2005 12:48 PM
Welcome Chris,
I absolutely don't deny that the world is slowly moving to an on-demand model of computing.
For years we've seen the "renting" of storage space. More recently the leasing of processing muscle. But, I also have utter faith in the redundancies that are put in place in thses two areas to offer five 9's of availability.
I mentioned in my earlier post, one of my big concerns lies in the fact that Internet conections are still to spotty to make this a viable idea. The stability of web browsers also concerns me. If I'm half-way thorugh a document and get the infamous "not responding" error, I would be a less than happy camper. Scratch that, I would be a down right pissed lil' Weeblo.
I know "save often" is just a smart computing practice, but client side word processors have finally reached the point where this becomes a best practice rather than an utter necessity.
The WebProcessor can not say the same.
Yes, we are going to go to this. But to get early adopters they are going to have to offer an extremely competititve price, along with a slew of features not offered in MS Office or one of its bertheren.
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I absolutely don't deny that the world is slowly moving to an on-demand model of computing.
For years we've seen the "renting" of storage space. More recently the leasing of processing muscle. But, I also have utter faith in the redundancies that are put in place in thses two areas to offer five 9's of availability.
I mentioned in my earlier post, one of my big concerns lies in the fact that Internet conections are still to spotty to make this a viable idea. The stability of web browsers also concerns me. If I'm half-way thorugh a document and get the infamous "not responding" error, I would be a less than happy camper. Scratch that, I would be a down right pissed lil' Weeblo.
I know "save often" is just a smart computing practice, but client side word processors have finally reached the point where this becomes a best practice rather than an utter necessity.
The WebProcessor can not say the same.
Yes, we are going to go to this. But to get early adopters they are going to have to offer an extremely competititve price, along with a slew of features not offered in MS Office or one of its bertheren.
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