Where your Uncle Dave works, our IT department (a group who makes Mordac look like a saint) has us use Office 2003 on XP. At home, I still use a copy of Office 2000. I’ve tried newer versions, but am annoyed at the seemingly gratuitous UI changes MS loves to make, plus I haven’t needed anything the new versions add. I’ve tried the assorted free ‘replacements’ like OpenOffice and others and found them impressive but wanting. I just find MS’ offering extremely easy to use and well designed for the things I do. For now, I’m sticking with what I have.
What do you think of Office? What version are you using? Planning to upgrade? What about the online alternatives like Google’s? Will you try out/start using MS’ online version? Given this article’s final point, why would anyone buy the upgrade?
It’s difficult to overstate the success of Microsoft Office. Calling it one of the best-selling tech products of all time is a bit like calling Michael Jackson a very popular musician—it’s certainly accurate, but it woefully misses the mark. According to Microsoft, more than 500 million people around the world use the Fantastic Four of productivity apps—Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook.
[..]
Office 2010 offers lots of new features and several user-interface improvements over previous versions. […] Still, as I tested out the new version, I couldn’t help wonder about Office’s future. In its last couple of earnings reports, Microsoft has reported rare declines in revenue from sales of Office. The company blames the sluggishness on weakness in the economy—a reasonable explanation, though one that perhaps masks a larger malaise. For one thing, Office’s success has bred a kind of inertia. Once you’ve grown used to a certain version of Word—and can do pretty much everything you need to do with it—why would you ever need the next version?
[…]
So the next version of Office looks to be an improvement on the 2007 edition—and with the Starter Edition and great new Web apps, it could even succeed in staving off competition from free online rivals. That sounds great for Microsoft, except for one thing: In trying to win the war against free apps, Microsoft will have had to emulate them. You used to have to pay several hundred dollars for a copy of Office. Now, you don’t really have to. Online and in new computers, Microsoft will give away a slate of productivity apps that, for most people, will be good enough. And thus, the question remains: Does anyone really need to buy a new version of Office anymore?
UPDATE: Commenter AC_in_Mich mentioned that in the latest versions, the majority of the changes to Office relate to collaboration on documents. Exactly how often do multiple people actually work on a single document? Is this really something that goes on a lot? I’ve never seen it in the wild.
Missing option:
Yes. I have a TechNet subscription, I am already running the current version of 2010.
I don’t know what they did to cause Outlook to speed up at launch, but man, it is FAST.
I like the ribbon. I didn’t at first such as many others, but I am used to it now.
I am also looking forward to the Mac version 2011 with a REAL version of Outlook & .OST/PST support as opposed to this Entourage DB.
“I didn’t at first such as many others, but I am used to it now.”
Sort of like a frog in boiling water. To me the ribbon interface was simply a different way of doing the exact same thing. Changes for the sake of changes are asinine as far as I’m concerned.
Heard an interesting statistic from Intel’s annual investor meeting – the CEO said the PC industry is now selling over 1 million computers every single day worldwide. (He also said sales of tablet computers were by comparison – insignificant)
This is a huge number and the vast majority (90%) of them have Windows. Office might be old and boring, there is a huge growing market for Office 2010.
I wish I hadn’t upgraded to the LAST version of Word!
Office 2007 on me PC and Office 2008 for Mac are good enough for me.
HELL NO! I ain’t gonna upgrade!
I hate the 2007 ribbon still – I have to use it at work. When I’m at home, I use OpenOffice. It does everything I need it to do. I’ve tried uploading a couple of my OO docs to GoogleDocs, but they didn’t come out even close to what they should have looked like. Zoho Docs worked better than GoogleDocs, but it still wasn’t right. I’m sticking with OO!
I wish Openoffice will copy the Ribbon Interface.
I’m using 2010 at work, and the online beta version at home. I’m very at home with the ribbon interface now, although there are times when I catch myself doing the 2003 ALT keystrokes now and again, and naturally getting bupkus. I think most users won’t need the upgrade though.
I thought Outlook was an “anti-productivity” app. You start it up, go get coffee, read the newspaper, maybe see a movie, then check to see it it’s got your e-mail yet.
I’d been Office 97 until about 3 years ago. I upgraded to Office 2003 just before 2007 came out. I’ll probably keep using 2003 until MS decides to rig the latest version of Windows so it can’t run it any more.
OFFICE,
Has a few problems..
Its major one is RAM. its the biggest hog on ram ever.
The 1 thing MS CANT/wont/never learned was how to FREE UP RAM. OFFICE loads everything, needed/unneeded/unwanted/.. If you dont use it, WHO cares.
MS has always had problems with memory management..And recently they have forgotten what NT GAVE THEM. considering MS didnt make NT, its a big lesson. And The NEXT windows may be either the LAST or best, as they have hired a few MULTI CPU MAINFRAME programmers FINALLY.
It’ll just happen. Everyone will upgrade just like Windows 7 without thinking. One ribbon to rule them all, one ribbon to bind them….
Personally I just use a good text editor and the web for most of my writing. I’ve also got a collection of rails build scripts to convert text to some other format. I know it’s geeky, but I like the lightness and quickness of it.
I’ve been using Office 2000 since it came out and I have absolutely no reason to upgrade. It does everything I want it to, and I don’t have the time nor the inclination to learn about how to use a ribbon or any of the other features I probably wouldn’t use on a newer version.
I also hate the 2007 ribbon still.
2003 was the best version (only have at work). Really, Office95 is fine for me. I hate my copy of 2007.
Outlook?
Express..
EXPRESS had a feature, to read Email as TXT only…NOT in Outlook. WEIRD.
So I went to thunderbird. I dont need no #@$@$@# graphics in my EMAIL..and I dont need Email Pulling graphics/data FROm the net while I read it.
I still like Office 97 Best. After that, it was all about collaboration crap. Well, I’m not a 1,000 member company trying all to edit and share a document. I’d much rather have the speed.
Just reverted to 2003 from 2007. That was my upgrade path.
I used to hate OpenOffice. The margins made it look like Adobe Illustrator or Aldus Pagemaker. After some customizing, I made it look like MS Word. Did not miss Word after that.
I never save files as Doc or Docx. I save as RTF. All word processing software support RTF. RTF does not support VBA and is safer.
OpenOffice today is way better than MS Office. Outlook has a stupid interface, compared to Outlook Express. The folder structure will make your head spin. Most people seem to use Outlook for the reminders feature. Sadly, Thunderbird and Evince are trying to ape Outlook and bring in the complexity of the interface.
I use Seamonkey (Mozilla’s version of Netscape Communicator) in place of OE. It has a faster message search and less security issues. With the Modern theme, it looks quite sophisticated – Netscape 6.
My school has been offering it for download for free for a couple weeks. On one computer I updated Office the minute it was available and messed with it and I’ve never bothered to update my other computer from 2007. I think that says how compelling an update it is if you are already using 2007…
I meant Evolution, not Evince. OpenOffice applications, particularly their toolbars, look prettier in Linux than in Windows. Only problem is that they do not seem to support OpenType fonts in Linux, which they support in Windows.
who even uses 2003 with no ribbon anymore. u guys r the biggest bunch of reactionary fogies on the net.
I still use 2000 Pro.
I really don’t want to spend 500+ dollars for another version thanks. I’m cheap.
To all you whom use Outlook…
STOP
You are the ones allowing the maximum amount of spam and malware to continue to exist. Go to web based accounts and get away from that application.
Oh and if you use Excel, stop that shit too. No one needs to use that anymore either. Spreadsheet usage is like people still using RPG or COBOL. Either use real accounting software if you REALLY work with money and figures or use an actual database application if that is what you are using a spreadsheet for now.
Cursor_
#22
Our real accounting software outputs all its reports into Excel sheets directly into Exchange hosted shared folders, which are easily accessed in outlook, and reopened, and edited and copy pasted to and from in Excel.
And Open Office, Guffaw… LOL
I’ve used just about all of the versions of Office, including the newer ones. For my purposes at home, there’s really no reason to have anything newer than Office 2000. Would I use Windows 2000 today? Hell no.
Call it morbid curiosity or lazy impetuousness but I have just this moment finished installing 2010 onto a three year old Dell. And I am still here.
What do I think of Office?
One day I’ll buy a baseball bat and fly to Seattle to explain to the developers exactly what I think.
#11, I just opened up word and its 11Mb of RAM is pretty small.
Notepad by comparison uses up a massive 4Mb which seems EXTREMELY high given what it is capable of in 4Mb an what word can do with 11Mb.
Amazingly, Wordpad uses up 16Mb! WTF!
Not these numbers are just one Office/text editor application open with no documents loaded, but how can you claim that Office is a memory hog? Especially compared to editors that have 5% the functionality but use more resources?
#18, so let me get this straight, you hated Word so much you switched to OO, but only because you could make it look just like Word.
Um, something doesn’t quite make sense about that…
Not that I’m the world’s biggest MS/Office fan but it does what it does very easily and well especially in comparison with the lacklustre alternatives out there.
I’ll only go to 2010 when I actually need to though. 2007 is fine for me, though it would be nice to have the same ribbon UI in all the office apps. It actually seemed to do what MS hoped, which was get all the relevant tools out in the open instead of making users drill down through various menus to do pretty simple things like pre 07 versions did.
I don’t hate Office or like it. It just has way more features than I’ll ever need. Occasionally I need a spreadsheet, but it doesn’t justify the cost.
The real reason people buy it is file compatibility, and unlike most people posting here, they won’t even try something new. The thing that makes me sick about the upgrade is they’re trying to shove SharePoint down everyone’s throat. SharePoint is the work of the devil.
28,
and which comes up fastest?
AND did you know that OFFICE, installs most of its drivers when you BOOT windows? they are always there running. And for those that know this, there is also a speed load for Word.
TRY Safe mode, and check the size windows is running.. should get a closer estimate.
29,
as you say..
PRICE for what it does.
ECA, I personally think of Windows mainly as a platform to run Office.