Google Apps and the power of embedded functionality

There been a lot of talk today about Google releasing a suite of hosted applications, starting with basic communications (email, talk) running on your own domain and then more Office-like apps such as word processing and spreadsheets. Most of the discussion has been in casting this as a competitor to Microsoft's Office. But I think there's something entirely different (and a lot more interesting) going on.

As Anil Dash discusses here, these web-based apps are not meant to replace Office but to complement it by doing things online that desktop software just can't do well. What might those things be? I think we have a hint in the spread of embedded video, courtesy of YouTube. The ability to easily embed into any blog page a full-featured videoplayer dedicated to a single video is a large part of YouTube's success. It doesn't require you to go elsewhere or download anything--it just works.

Now imagine the same model working for data. Rather than me posting static jpeg charts and links to Excel spreadsheet files, what if I could post data the way I post videos: as an embedded mini-app that simply displays the data in a useful way, allowing readers to manipulate or copy it at will? This would be a little like what Ray Ozzie (Microsoft's Gates V2.0) calls "Live Clipboard", which is a proposed way to copy and paste code, structured data and even functionality from website to website, just as we currently do with plain text.

That's what I want. Not an online spreadsheet that simply replicates what Excel already does perfectly well on my laptop, but small spreadsheet elements that I can paste into a blog post in the form of a specific data set or graph. The fact that they're hosted elsewhere is what would make them simple enough to use, just as embedding YouTube video is so head-slapping easy today. That's not yet the case for the woefully under-featured Google spreadsheet (there's no graphing and you can't make it open to all), but don't be surprised if Microsoft under Ozzie does better with Office Live. The embedded functionality era has just begun. YouTube is just the start of something much bigger. 

Comments

[Nigel Pond]

Posting images like you would copy from clipboard? That's what I'm trying to do with my site - users can post URL for an image (as a hotlink which some may see as evil?) I'm currently half-way through TLT and I have to say that I'm using it consciously to design the site in its functionality and its economic direction... Although I'm thinking that I may be trying to do much by myself so I may have to tap TLT of PHP developers...

[csven]

I'm betting a kind of Google PLM isn't too far off down the road. Google Office + Google Earth = Google 3D Internet (with embedded advertising).

[Rex Hammock]

Chris, perhaps the way you're describing Ozzie's concept is what I'm about to say, but when MS first announced they were including RSS in Vista (not just IE, but the OS), the possible scenarios they used of how it may show up are similar to what you describe. In layman's terms (except laymen don't use the terms RSS and Atom), one should be able to have an Excel spreadsheet on ones desktop or posted online, where each cell could be a separate RSS (or Atom) feed so that when the cell on the source file is updated, the subscribing cells are updated via the RSS feed. I guess that's the "live clipboard" thing -- but I'm with you: All of that has to be simplified so that the technology enabling it is hidden and as easy to use and display as YouTube is making video.

[David]

At some point we won't even need to have computers. We'll all just be part of a huge living network.

[Hazen]

To me this seems that this is further evidence that Google is trying to commoditize stuff that Microsoft makes a killing off of. By making it free and easily accessible, it'll pressure MS to react, and probably decrease the price & competitive advantage, etc which in turn hurts the bottom line of Microsoft.

[Dave Whorner]

Have you read the Joe Krauss post on the long tail of applications?

http://bnoopy.typepad.com/bnoopy/2005/03/the_long_tail_o.html

[Bruce]

"...not meant to replace Office but to compliment it..."

Chris,

Love your book and this blog, but did you mean "compliment" or "complement"?

[Chris Anderson]

Bruce,

Good catch. Fixed...

-c

[Marshall Kirkpatrick]

I think this app from Dapper may be an example of just what you are looking for. I reviewed the whole system here.

[Richard Michie]

Personally I'm all for anything that starts to shake Microsoft out of it's monopoly. We've all put up too long with the stuff we're forced to use. But you're right, Google needs to offer something more than just another spreadsheet and I'm surprised that that's just what they've done where's the little unique twist?

[Ramesh]

Hi Chris,

I am Ramesh from Zoho Sheet, an online spreadsheet application. We already support publishing of live charts, where you can create a chart in your Zoho spreadsheet and then embed the chart in any web page. Changes in the Zoho spreadsheet will automatically be reflected in the published chart. We will also be supporting embedding the spreadsheet itself very soon.

Regards,
Ramesh

[Peter Forret]

And in the series "What would the Youtube of ... look like":
Youtube for PDF: embedding documents

[Eduardo]

I am Eduardo from eyeOS

Our aim is to replace not only the Office Apps, but all the apps that a user needs. So we can have a browser-computer that connects to a server (we are GPL, so it can be our server or your own server with eyeOS installed on it) and all you need is there. Not yet there though ... :)

[RP Mickler]

Chris, it comes down to your observations on choice, niches, the appeal of software as a plug-n-play component. The consumer was options and increasing, the consumer requires options integrated into medium of choice. Consumer choice, ubiquity, ease of use and motion, an integrated/open/integrated (holistic) experiences, combined with a great price tag (free), exposes Microsoft's (and other ISV's, for that matter) solutions as bottlenecks. As you pointed out in your book, a wiki defeated the encyclopedia publishing bottleneck. Writely, Online Spreadsheets, OpenOffice, will work similarly to release the bottleneck - no barrier to entry.

R

[san]

Love your book and this blog

[Carbon copy PRO]

Hi,
Well post.Besides Google spreadsheets, there are various online spreadsheets working in different directions.