Enterprise 2.0 News

Zoho (as usuall very quietly) launched the new service Zoho Assist - the solution for remote customer support (primarily useful for software vendors). Of course, it's not the revolutionary service for Zoho because long ago they developed Zoho Meeting - the web-conferencing tool. And Zoho Assist is built on top of it. It works like this: support technician creates an online session and invites customer (via email). The customer clicks on the link in the mail, opens the session in the browser and (in one click) installs the small plugin for remote control. Then the technician can demonstrate his own desktop to customer or remotely control his computer. ***

Now it's time for another portion of criticism towards the Acrobat.com online office. The last time we reviewed the service, they introduced many useful features, but now they are doing strange things again. Although the press release looks nice: Acrobat.com added online collaboration work-spaces. In fact, they added only shared folders were you can invite your co-workers / clients for file collaboration. Previously, it was possible to share only separate files. So there is more PR than improvements made during several months. Besides Adobe decided that online shared folders - it is so demanded tool on the market that they can make money on it. Although the cost of service was not risen, but the free version allows to create only one workspace (shared folder), and the Premium Basic plan (which costs $15/month) - is limited to 20 shared folders. In addition (very odd) you can't access shared folders on your mobile device (Blackberry and iPhone). ***

Microsoft Office Labs, that develops different innovative projects for MS office applications, announced that they are now testing the enterprise microblogging system called OfficeTalk. It's Twitter clone for in-house use, that allows to send messages (limited to 140 characters) and add comments to them. Every user - has a profile and can subscribe to other's feeds. In general, nothing new, and the emergence of such a product from any other vendor would be at least strange. Because the enterprise microblogging market is full of strong players - from Yammer to Google Buzz. Moreover, third-party vendors have already equipped MS Sharepoint with microblogging tools. However, Microsoft, having a huge base of customers and partners is still able to make money on this solution. Besides, may be they will integrate this microblogging tool to Outlook or MS Communications Server, that would be more interesting. ***

Recently, Google released the next anti-microsoft tool - Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Exchange, the plugin which allows you to easily move mail, calendars and contacts from Exchange to Google Apps. Last year they released the utility that syncs Outlook with Google Apps, but now you can import data directly from the Exchange server. Previously, Microsoft just ignored such events, or commented that Google Apps - is just a toy that no serious company will use. But Google's constant pressure is making them nervous. Microsoft recently launched the channel on Youtube, which contains videos explaining why MS Office products are better than Google's. For example, here's the video Exchange vs GMail: ***

Harmony, the new plug-in for MS Outlook by Mainsoft gave us a lot of positive emotions, which we want to share. First, is its video presentation, which is really cool. Secondly, Harmony - is really useful tool that allows to access and collaborate with documents stored in Google Docs or MS Sharepoint, without leaving MS Outlook. In particular, you can open and edit office documents directly in Outlook, search in docs content and share documents with co-workers instead of sending them back and forth. And it's not necessary that your co-workers have this plug-in installed and have Google Docs account - they just click the link in the email and the document will be shared to them automatically (for viewing or editing). ***

Do you still remember Google Wave? This is the super-service which is going to change the world. Why it hasn't done this yet? Because it's too complicated, so bugs will be being fixed for a long time and people will need more time to learn how to work with it. Google Wave was introduced as an alternative to Email. Instead of cumbersome email-correspondence all messages are located on the same page. Great idea, but first, the creators underestimated the people's affection to e-mail, and secondly, they overloaded this page with too many features. Unlike Google Wave, Threadbox is going to be simpler and works perfectly together with the e-mail. ***

Day by day the consumer marketplace (the place where consumers live, search for goods, shop and interact with suppliers) is moving to Facebook. Almost every FMCG manufacturer has its own fan page on Facebook, where the company representatives communicate with customers and customers communicate with each other. Why not create a support forum there? Get Satisfaction has implemented this idea in Facebook Social Engagement Hub. Now the support request can be that easy as a message to your friend in Facebook. Get Satisfaction - is the most interesting service that enables to create support forums. It allows to use crowdsourcing effectively and reduce the load on your support department. This tool is used by Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, Nike and another 10000 (paying) companies. ***

As expected, Google has launched the online store Google Apps Marketplace, which allows developers to easily access the Google Apps userbase, which counts 25 million users. More than 50 providers already used this opportunity - now the Google Apps users (directly in the control panel) can add Atlassian Jira bug tracker, DimDim web conferencing, Freshbooks online accounting, Box.net intranet, Manymoon project management, SlideRocket presentations, etc. There you can find even such heavyweights as NetSuite and SuccessFactors. We also note the presence of Zoho apps - Google has once again demonstrated its loyalty towards the competitor. ***

Recently the planet has become a dangerous place. Haiti, Chile, Turkey. Where will be the next earthquake? What will you do if the roof fall on your server (or data center) and all your business data will be lost? Apparently, Google decided to benefit on this situation and published the post that talks about how Google Apps protect business data from disasters. To ensure the security of user data in Gmail, Google Docs, Google Sites, Google Calendar, Google Talk and Google Video it's beeing synchronized in real time between the two remote data centers. If suddenly one of these data centers will be destroyed, the data will be immediately replicated to the third data center and so on. This technology is used in the large companies, but, for example, real-time synchronization of 25Gb Mailbox costs them $150-500. And Google offers this service for free, despite the fact that the service is used by 2 million companies with 20 million active users. ***

Jason Fried, 37Signals co-founder, exactly knows how to create beautiful systems. Basecamp users and Ruby on Rails developers know this. Recently he published the video with his vision of how to create a beautiful workspace (on the example of 37Signals) and how online tools can help. Jason started with the fact that in most companies collaboration is organized absolutely wrong. It's based on the constant interruptions. Employee just turns on the computer, and the interruptions begin: instant messages, email notifications, phone calls and of course, co-workers that come and ask something. No one can work productively in such environment. And, often collaboration software (especially messengers and microblogs) doesn't help to mute this noise, but increase it. ***