It seems not even Google are impervious to the recession as they have started tightening their grip on their free Apps. Google’s income growth has slowed considerably, and this is another method of trying to increase revenue following the 100 job cuts and the recent demise of some popular Google products such as Google video and Google Notebook.
Basically there are over a million businesses that use the free version of Google Apps that supports advertising. Google is now reducing the functionality of these accounts, such as lowering the number of user accounts allowed to almost force users into purchasing the premium versions of the applications.
When Google Apps was first launched in 2006, it was completely free. The description of the suite was:
A service available at no cost to organisations of all shapes and sizes
Since then, Google brought out a premier version early in 2007 with additional extras such as additional storage space as the selling point. Eventually the future of Google Apps is that it will become a premium service.
When discussing this with my colleagues, the initial reaction was that they would stop using Google Apps and just use i.e. Microsoft. However, the beauty of Google Apps is the collabarative element that allows multiple users to work from the same document. As Google further tightens it’s grip, perhaps we will look onto other free online applications?
