In a reversal, Microsoft says it will now charge all small businesses an annual domain registration fee, even those companies it had promised free Web site registrations for life.
Starting October 1, all customers will have to pay $14.95 a year to renew their custom Web address. Microsoft offers Web site registration as part of its Office Live Small Business service. In some ways, it's understandable, given that Microsoft has to pay fees each year in order to keep renewing the domains.
However, the move does mean the software maker is going back on a promise it made last year. As part of a series of changes made in February 2008, the company said that new customers of Office Live Small Business would have to pay for domain renewals after the first year, but promised that early customers of the services would get their domains registered for free "in perpetuity."
In a statement, Microsoft acknowledged the shift.
"Yes, it is a change," Microsoft said in a statement to CNET News. "As you know, we made a decision in February 2008 to begin charging $14.95 (per) year for custom domain name renewals for new customers. Now, we're asking all customers to pay this same fee once their domain comes up for renewal."
Microsoft did say that the price is quite competitive and noted that the majority of its Office Live small business services are still offered for free. Those that want a Web site for free have the option of moving their site from a custom domain and onto their own portion of the Office Live domain.
However, Microsoft notes that while the Web site will transfer, other data could be lost.
"All e-mail accounts on the expired domain name will be automatically removed and e-mail messages will not be saved," Microsoft said on its Web site, adding a link to a page offering methods of backing up such data.
The move comes as Microsoft is shifting more of its online attention toward bringing the full Office suite on to the Web, as opposed to ancillary services. Free, browser-based versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote are coming next year as part of Office 2010.
The Office Live Small Business tools date back to the earliest days of Microsoft's Live push, first announced in late 2005 and released in final form in November 2006.
Microsoft confirmed on Friday that it is pushing together its Office Live and Windows Live efforts.
The company isn't changing the development cycle or the leadership of the teams working on the products, but it is promising that consumers will be able to get to both sets of services from a common Web location.
Microsoft didn't say exactly what that spot will be, but the Windows Live branding is expected to be the one that survives the combination, I'm hearing. (But what about Officeliveworkspacecommunity.com? Does Microsoft really want to give up that prime, easy-to-remember address?)
Although it declined to clarify whether Thursday's job cuts affected the Windows Live and Office Live teams, the company said there were no changes to the top ranks of either group.
The merging was first noted on Thursday by ZDNet blogger Mary Jo Foley.
Those wanting to get their hands on the Web-based versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint will have to wait a little bit longer.
Business Division President Stephen Elop said in an October interview that a technology preview of the browser-based applications would come this year, followed by a beta in 2009. However, it turns out Microsoft is using a rather tortured interpretation of the term "technology preview."
It's currently being used by fewer than 1,000 Microsoft employees, as part of a test that started last month and is slated to go through February. Consumers won't be able to try a test version of the products until sometime next year. Microsoft isn't saying when, but I'd say you'll have plenty of time to try the Windows 7 beta before you have to worry about testing the Office Web apps.
Ultimately, Microsoft is planning the release of the Office Web Applications in conjunction with the next wave of Office product, code-named Office 14. Microsoft has not offered a release date for the desktop version of Office 14.
Microsoft is planning two ways of offering the browser-based Office programs--one for consumers and the other for businesses looking to offer Office Web apps to their workers. Consumers will be able to use them through Office Live. The company currently has a free product called Office Live Workspace that lets users view and share--but not edit--Office documents.
Meanwhile, rivals like Google and Zoho already offer editing abilities. Microsoft is staking its claim on being able to offer better compatibility and document fidelity with its products. The company has recently had some big customers consider abandoning Office and move to Google Apps, but has wooed some of them back by sharing their plan for the Office Web apps.
Procter & Gamble, for example, took a long look at moving to Google Apps, but decided to stick with Microsoft after some high-powered lobbying from Redmond. Elop said that Microsoft's pitch included details on its plans for the Web-based versions of the Office programs.
"This was part of the conversation, absolutely," Elop said. "We have been sharing with customers under varying circumstances to a greater or lesser extent."
Microsoft has not definitively said how it will price the products, but it has noted that Office Live has both subscription and free products, suggesting it may have both free and paid versions of the Web apps.
For businesses, the Office Web Applications will be offered as part of Microsoft's SharePoint server. In either case, the Office Web Apps will only work when a computer is connected to the Internet.
Energizer CIO Randy Benz told me last month that he expects the Office Web Applications to open doors for him. Benz said that a lower-cost Web-only option probably won't lower the overall cost of Office for his company, but it should mean that a new class of workers gets access to Office.
"Every PC has the full (Office) suite," Benz said. "But we limit the number of PCs."
Microsoft Vice President Chris Capossela said he sees things similarly. Right now there about 500 million users of Office, he said, but a lot of those copies haven't been paid for.
"We see a tremendous opportunity to sell more," he said.
LOS ANGELES--After years of questioning the value of Net-based productivity applications, Microsoft confirmed Tuesday that it will offer new versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint that can run from within a standard Web browser.
As first reported by CNET News last week, Microsoft will use its Professional Developer Conference here to show off browser-based versions of its Office programs.
In an interview, Microsoft Business Division President Stephen Elop said that the browser-based editing capabilities are being developed in conjunction with the next version of Office, known as Office 14. Microsoft won't say when that version will arrive, but Elop said that a technology preview of the browser-based products will come later this year and that a beta version will be released in 2009.
Microsoft will offer browser-based Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in two ways. For consumers, they will be offered via Microsoft's Office Live Web site, while businesses will be able to offer browser-based Office capabilities through Microsoft's SharePoint Server product.
The company has been pushed into this arena by Google, which has been offering its free Google Apps programs for some time. In competing with Google, Microsoft is touting the ability to use Microsoft's familiar user interface, as well as the fact that all of the document's characteristics are preserved.
"If you go into some competitive products right now and take a Word document in and then spit it out afterword, it's unrecognizable," Elop said. "You lose a lot of fidelity."
Elop said that not all of the editing capabilities of the desktop products are in the browser versions. "The editing we are characterizing as lightweight editing," he said.
Although Google Apps has seen most of its popularity among consumers, it has started to attract attention from corporate customers. Google Apps got a strong look from Procter & Gamble, which only decided to stick with Office after a strong push from Microsoft. Part of that pitch, Elop said, included Microsoft offering details on its plans for the Web-based versions of the Office programs.
"This was part of the conversation, absolutely," Elop said. "We have been sharing with customers under varying circumstances to a greater or lesser extent."
Although he didn't name names, Elop said Microsoft has found itself in a competitive situation with Google in other business accounts as well.
Microsoft is making a series of changes to its Office Live Small Business service, offering some previously paid-for services free, while adding a new charge for domain name registration after the first year.
Domain name registration will continue to be free for the first year. But each subsequent year Microsoft will charge $14.95, though it will add the ability for so-called private registration, where customers can keep their personal information out of the public Whois database. Microsoft said that those who have already signed up for Office Live will continue to have their domain name registered for free "in perpetuity."
The company has about 600,000 subscribers for Office Live, which offers, among other things, free e-mail accounts and Web site creation and hosting. The service is tailored to the smallest of businesses that have neither an IT staff nor an outside technology consultant. Microsoft first announced plans for Office Live in November 2005 as part of its Live services push. The service launched in test form in February 2006 and dropped the beta tag in November 2006.
As part of the changes, Microsoft is consolidating its three separate service plans into one, while making all of the paid services an a la carte option.
Two services that had been paid--contact management and Intranet portal creation--will now be free.
Microsoft is also bulking up the ability to use Office Live sites to sell stuff, adding paid options for creating a storefront, selling items on eBay, and e-mail marketing.
"What we have been providing so far is a lot of basic IT services," said Baris Cetinok, director of product management and marketing for Office Live. "Now we are also making a bigger investment into digital marketing tools."
Microsoft recently renamed the service Office Live Small Business as it looks to use the Office Live brand for other products, including its Office Live Workspaces, an online document-sharing service.
With the new release, Microsoft is adding support for Firefox, specifically version 2.0, on both Macs and PCs.
The move comes as Yahoo made several changes to its small-business offering, including adding unlimited storage and transfer for its Web site hosting service. Of course, those products could become one at some point if Microsoft gets its way.
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