Micheal Robertsons new venture only supports Firefox

Comparable to word? Try notepad. Notepad also opens in less then 6 seconds.

rjdohnert wrote:

The www.ajaxlaunch.com has AjaxWrite.  The funny thing is it doesnt support IE, you must have Firefox.  And they want to talk about giving choice.

EDIT:  Site is down now

Funny indeed, I'm using Firefox 1.5 with javascript enabled and it still reckons I don't. Stupid JavaScript detection.

Edit: Ok, so that's what happens if you open it in a new tab, you have to launch a new window.

Comperable to WordPad maybe, Writely got a lot closer to Word than this.

I couldn't even get it to remove the strikethrough formating on

Microsoft Office Professional 2007 - $499

As a starting point it pretty good, but I don't see it competing with Word without requiring at least 10Mb of Javascript code.

I been keeping an eye on the link at the bottom to track the response of bloggers. The ATOM feeds for Google's blogsearch is awesome. So far its pretty much been 100% positive.

http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch?hl=en&q=ajaxLaunch&btnG=Search+Blogs

ajaxLaunch is apaprently launching a new ajax based application every so it looks like he's in it for the long haul.

Anyone think he'll slowly fill in the gaps and try to offer a spreadsheet/presentation software/etc as a gradual replacement for ms office?

there should be a band called "Michael Robertsons New Venture"
haha

LeighS wrote:

I thought it was just me. I went there to look and the noble goals of

Global access, all you need is an internet connection

Platform independent, you can use it with any operating system

Doesn't include other browsers.

The "giving you CHOICE" theme is popular with Michael Robertson.

Michael Robertson started MP3.com... it was all about "choice" and sticking it to the record labels... right up until he sold out to Vivendi for $385 million.

Lindows was all about "choice," "freedom," blah blah, until Microsoft sued him and made him rename it to Linspire.  Linspire got a lot of backlash from the Linux community for basically charging people between $20 and $50/year for a modified Debian distro, and running everything as root.  A FREE version called Freespire popped up without the permission of Robertson, but apparently that "choice" of a name was BAD so the author voluntarily changed it.  "Freespire" changed its name to "SquiggleOS" and then... it disappeared.  So much for that choice...

He then founded SIPphone to give you "choice" in telephone services, then decided to sue Vonage for false and misleading advertising.  (Apparently choosing Vonage was bad.)

He then founded MP3Tunes, an alternative "choice" to the iTunes Music Store, except it doesn't use DRM.  As you might imagine, record companies have not exactly been lining up around the block to have their music listed on MP3Tunes, because there's no copy protection or DRM on the music that's sold there.  Assuming his master plan doesn't involve ANOTHER sell-out to Vivendi for $385 million, I have to wonder how he's going to make money.

And now we have an AJAX word processor.  Sigh.

"Choice" is a much nicer word than "copycat," don't you think?

rjdohnert wrote:

EDIT:  Site is down now

Exactly.

Sites back up.  It also doesnt work with Netscape 8.  I tried and it kept giving me the "You must have Firefox installed"

The guys over at Neowin have a rather amusing take on this.

While this makes a good proof-of-concept, I doubt adoption will be big.  Among business users security, reliability and availability are going to be an issue and so far two of those are far from being proven.  Home users I dont think will care that much.

Hmmm...it doesn't even accept Opera. Oh well, I'll stick to OpenOffice.

I tried with Firefox 1.5, 2.0a and Epiphany (uses Gecko) and worked fine.. but I'll stick with AbiWord .
But I think it's pretty interesting project.

The idea might be good, but they must first understand the rest of the context.

If 90% of the world is using a word processer with this experience and functionallity then I seriously question why they ever stepped away from a machine like this:

rjdohnert wrote:

The funny thing is it doesnt support IE, you must have Firefox.

Even more amusing I think, is the fact that the site works best (according to Robertson) with Firefox 1.5..... which isn't available via Linspire's CNR service.

Karim wrote:

A FREE version called Freespire popped up without the permission of Robertson, but apparently that "choice" of a name was BAD so the author voluntarily changed it.

I'm embarrassed to say I was the person behind Freespire.

I have to say I was utterly flabberghasted when I got an email from the CEO of Linspire essentially telling me to: Change the name or we'll have to send in the lawyers. PS. I want that freespire domain name too.

I used to think Linspire was a 'nice company' but I have discovered many nasty things going on that make me froth at the mouth.