Monday, April 12, 2010

New Google Docs ---Document Nirvana or Document Socialism

So, Google releases a whole new update to google docs today with MUCH fanfare and the requisite sexy blog and youtube video... This ones been in me for a while, and while there are a lot of little reasons I'm not sold (such as dont see biz value of Simultaneous editing, Version control really weak, Change tracking is not so hot, offline access, feature parity to SW) these gaps will are are being closed.)

I think the biggest reason is I want to own my docs!!!

I live my life in a world of docs, spreadsheets and presos, they are the way I create, communicate and distribute intellectual property. Yes, I often do this in teams, and LOVE Box.net for that. But I don't really want you to change that formula or that bullet point and obliterate my content. Do it, save it and call it V2. If I do let you do it to the live one, how do I easily and painlessly see the changes from the one on my hard drive??

I think content ownership IS a big deal ESPECIALLY when working with teams. To me, Google Doc paradigm is Content socialism, and I guess I want private property, even when I let you onto the property and even move the furniture! I've always found pass the baton editing (Sharing sites like box.net fill the bill well for this) more effective than group gropes, which I love on the whiteboard but find incredibly frustrating when dealing with constrained content like Docs, spreadsheet and presos...

Am I a dinosaur?? What do you think???

3 comments:

  1. Um, do you own your blogspot?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey, you should check out CertiVox for content private property. Shameless plug. Ken, miss you on the other side of the pond, bro!

    ReplyDelete

 
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