Why is Google trying to imitate Microsoft's lamest product?
Google relaunched JotSpot, a group wiki it acquired in 2006, as Google Sites today. It's a collaborative wiki. Whatever. For a PR-friendly feature list, go check out Google PR. What we want to know is: What took so long? And why did Google bother?
It's been 16 months since since Google acquired the company from Excite founders Joe Kraus and Graham Spencer. During that time JotSpot languished and users — like me and my coworkers at my old gig — suffered from bugs and poor customer service.
If you like, blame the delay on JotSpot employees wasting their time at Google. After all, Kraus runs OpenSocial, Google PR's answer to what once looked like the runaway success of Facebook's application platform. One former JotSpot employee, Google Sites product manager Scott Johnston, seems to use his 20 percent time sending Twitters.
But more likely the delay is due to limited market demand for a "Sharepoint killer." Microsoft's SharePoint, which lets you post huge PowerPoint presentations to a file server instead of clogging your Exchange box with extra copies, has been doing a good job of killing itself. Do you know anyone who uses SharePoint willingly and gladly, without being strongarmed by a central IT department?
