Google is always making news, but the report that the Google Apps have new features to compete with Microsoft Office is interesting as more users rely on free Google Apps. It’s hard to fathom that Wikipedia could be used as a news source, but Google is trying that out since so many users rely on Wikipedia as a source of reliable information. Without question Google continues to grow and evolve in interesting directions, clearly something we all have to watch.
Google vs. Microsoft (including Free Windows 7)
Notwithstanding the ongoing search engine wars between Google and the universe, Google Apps are apparently improving at time with Microsoft users are unhappy with the additional features in Office 2007 which causes new complications for users. Specifically the new features in Google spreadsheet are an improvement over Excel, and with the general unhappiness of Microsoft Vista clearly many users are awaiting Windows 7. So Microsoft’s original game-plan to move the PC world from XP to an new operating system, and of course related revenue from upgrades to the Office Suite, got a major stall since Vista has been such a major dud. So it’s not much of a surprise that Microsoft has revealed that users can get Windows 7 free or very low cost when released later this year if they buy a new computer now with the upgrade.
Wikipedia As A News Source?
Often Wikipedia shows up at the top of many Google searches and as result users tend to rely on Wikipedia has grown to over 2.9 articles. But recently Google News has also been including Wikipedia links so that users can read more about topics. Interestingly enough no one at Google asked Wikipedia and the folks at Wikipedia learned of the new Google News service use of Wikipedia by reading the Nieman Journalism Lab. With this evolution Google News has positioned the collaborative written source Wikipedia in direct competition with the New York Times, Washington Post, AOL, CNN, and other news sources.