Google offers hosted communications apps

Starting Monday, organizations will be able to offer members or employees Web-based e-mail, calendar, chat and Web page publishing hosted by Google for free.

Video: Google thinks small business
Take a first look at Google Apps for Your Domain

Google is now offering a beta version of Google Apps for Your Domain, which includes Gmail with 2 gigabytes of storage, Google Calendar, Google Talk and Page Creator.

The new service is an extension of Gmail for Your Domain, a service that Google launched in beta version in February. It allows organizations to use Gmail applications with their own e-mail address, instead of the "@gmail.com" domain.

The Gmail for Your Domain test service has tens of thousands of active domains, hundreds of thousands of users and hundreds of universities registered to use it, said Dave Girouard, vice president and general manager of Google's enterprise business.

The Google Apps for Your Domain service will allow organizations to outsource their communications applications to Google and to customize the user interface with their own branding and color scheme. Administrators will have access to an English-language Web-based control panel to do things like manage the user account list and set up aliases and distribution lists.

A premium edition with support and additional storage will be available by the end of the year for a fee, Girouard said. He declined to provide more details.

[engelsol]

Google Hosting: Google will become a foe to current partners

I use google every day, I am a big fan of it. But, now I am afraid google is going to compete with all small web design firms that offer webhosting for small business.

With this apps is obviously that they will soon or later will offer hosting for businesses.

So my question now. How do we all google partners should react and prepare?

[indychou]

It's a good news for small business company in TAIWAN.

For some boss who open a small business company in TAIWAN, they will get a low cost IT service.

But Google doesn't provide enough Trddition-Chinese web interface, so Google can not get lot customer of Taiwan.

I love Google those service, bcoz it's a good tool for people who don't want to maintain mail server.

[Pushrod]

This Sucks

It's like that whole thing with walmart against mom and pop shops but in the tech. sector. This sucks....

[Urza9814]

Excellent.

When will this be available to single users? :P
Seriously, if I could use my gmail as webhosting the way fastmail does it...oh man. I mean, I have a great webhost (theicy.net), but bandwidth is ALWAYS a problem. I'm sure google could provide more than enough :)

[boohoo7]

no mention of domains.live.com ???

Why no mention that domains.live.com was in this space FIRST, for a change?

[teamorca]

orcadesktop.com to use both Microsoft and Google Services

We have for some months now been testing Micrsoft servics on www.orcaa.com and gmail on www.orcawebos.com - and is going to (later this year) offer a full integration of both companys into ORCA@desktop.

I think its a good aproach by Google, however for "pro" use - i would suggest Microsoft's Office Live (atleast until ORCA is ready with our Office package)

Google is not alone..
----------------------
Team ORCA is also going to offer our applications free of charge - some of these can be tested in our "proff of concept" Beta 1 demo at www.orcadesktop.com/proton - with this i would like to hear what others think.

Kind Regards
Leon Bollerup
CEO, Team ORCA
[e-mail]

[df561]

...not really first

probably because our beloved Microsoft only implemented it after hearing about Google's plans first. Just like with the rumored GDrive and LiveDrive.

this is really going to be an interesting battle with Google.

[WJeansonne]

So what. Who Gives a Rat's Backside if Google Thought of it

At least Microsoft made it a reality and not just a concept. Get a grip!

[Central_office_tech]

Somone has been on one too many conspiracy theory sites

Google and or Yahoo is not going to take over every business. That is laughable. You think google is going to start selling cell phone service? Which provider? Will they start doing web design for small business? lol Which language. Any sucessful company looks to diversify. The threat of google is its volume. If your site is canned from google you loose access to 40% + of the worlds total search market.

But if you follow best practices this is not a problem. If you want to link span thier engine... This is a massive problem. Your search engine I will guess is something you hold a stake in. lol

[pbookman]

Google Bamboozles Microsoft

Google is in the business of monitizing search. They therefore must strategically defend their search dominance. Microsoft represents perhaps Google's biggest strategic threat because they are committed to search as a category (we will examine why this is so at the end of this post). Microsoft is using its proven approach of continuous improvement to slowly, inexorably get very good at search. They have the resources to keep at this for as long as it takes and they are relentless.

The Google strategy to defend against the Microsoft search threat is to attack Microsoft's strength, Microsoft Office. The mere threat of Google Office added to the existence of Open Office, has been enough to push Microsoft into a full commitment to some sort of online version of Office, an Office Live. Defend Office at all costs, please, Ray Ozzie! The amusing thing is that Google has pulled this off at very little cost, almost as a frolic.

[Captain_Spock]

"Google Bamboozles Microsoft"! Huh; History on Lotus/IBM's side!

As this "InformationWeek" :

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=192300431" target="_newWindow">http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=192300431</a>

has quoted Jeff Raikes, President of Microsoft's business division, as saying "Google is dabbling in Web-based productivity"; this article also states, "The Google solution is what I'd call patchwork, or Frankenstein, software," says Tom Rizzo, a director for Office SharePoint Server at Microsoft. "You have to put it all together yourself.". Against the old adge whisch states that "EXPERIENCE IS A GREAT TEACHER" I would therefore opt to bet the farm on fact that since it was IBM/Lotus who were the first I believe to bring "Web-based Productivity Applications" in the name of Lotus "KONA"; then, it is this working experience that one might suspect that Microsoft will draw from having knowledge of the inner workings of early IBM/Lotus efforts at Web-based Productivity Applications and having worked closely with IBM on the development of the OS/2 Operating System for which the Web-based productivity applications were targeted. Maybe, this would have been the time for (Lotus Symphony The follow-up to killer app 1-2-3, this '80s package (which) never took off) :-D

[stevesimpsondm]

Google Vs. <get_name>

It seems to come down to who Google is up against in this latest release. Try these:

vs. Me: I sell networking, services, infrastructure. I can be threatened if I view Google Apps For Your Domain as a replacement for the server-based communications I'm installing from Novell and Microsoft. If a small business can get e-mail, calendaring and e-comm for free, why should they buy a server and pay to have some schmuck keep it running?

My bigger concern is that this is the desktop-publishing or FrontPage of the e-comm set. DTP and FrontPage cheapened publishing and Web development by dumping tools on the market. I hope that GAFYD doesn't become that, making it harder to sell the value of real communications systems.

vs. Microsoft: Go get 'em! And good luck. If you view MSoft as a necessary evil, they will always be there. We've made them part of our corporate fabric. Noboby opens a document, they start Word (R) Microsoft Corporation. When was the last time you heard someone ask for an on-screen presentation? I even slip and call the process PowerPoint(R) Microsoft Corporation. "Start OpenOffice's Impress tool and start creating a PowerPoint presentation." Oops.

Want to get rid of Microsoft? Stop designing apps and systems that rely on them. Apps that only use SQL Server, systems that only integrate with Outlook? Don't build 'em and don't buy 'em. Hook into others, support open source, spread the love.

vs. Google: I've enjoyed Google and their inventiveness. They are truly remarkable. But are they diluting themselves? Are they are search firm (Google Earth IS about searching the world), a tools firm (Sketch, Writely, GAFYD) or a bunch of really smart people having fun with technology but not holding the tiller?

[edbong]

the buzz is incredible

There has been so much noise around Gapps... Google must be very happy... why spent on marketing to push a product to the market...partners are signing up too. We are doing some open source development around the GAPI our selves.. <a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.applicationexchange.com" target="_newWindow">http://www.applicationexchange.com</a>