The future of OneNote

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Posted by Paul Korm
Apr 20, 2018 at 08:44 PM

Microsoft’s revenue from Office commercial and consumer unit licenses and subscriptions in fiscal 2017 was $23 billion USD, with a 58% operating margin (EDITDA). I think they probably have enough money to make whatever they feel like making.

exatty95 wrote:
I hate to be unduly cynical, but I think that the only stable providers
>of this kind of software are those who either (1) charge enough for it
>(e.g., Evernote), or (2) can monetize it by targeting adds based on your
>content (e.g., Google). Microsoft didn’t seem to be either—maybe it
>was a defensive offering to try and keep people from adopting Google for
>more products? I guess Apple Notes could fit into that lane too,
>although it has users essentially captive in other ways.

Posted by NickG
Apr 21, 2018 at 07:25 AM

Originally it was an attempt to mimic Circus Ponies Notebook/Aquaminds Notetaker (both were offspring of a Next app whose name I can’t remember). I don’t see that Google has anything like this that MS would have had to respond to. I just think that MS is pushing people into the online space as hard as it can

Posted by satis
Apr 22, 2018 at 11:50 AM

Evernote operates on an “everything in a notebook” model, while Google utilizes Drive and Keep and Docs to provide a more traditional files/folders framework. Google changed its priorities from pushing out apps or competing in the app space when they want people instead to use their services. In the last two years they’ve made this more explicit, killing off Chrome-browser apps and Picasa amongst other things. I’m amazed Google Earth is still around.

OneNote and Microsoft To-Do are the alternative lock-in attempt by Microsoft, more emulating Apple’s ecosystem approach, while Google goes its own way.

Posted by Dr Andus
Apr 22, 2018 at 02:49 PM

satis wrote:
Evernote operates on an “everything in a notebook” model, while Google
>utilizes Drive and Keep and Docs to provide a more traditional
>files/folders framework. Google changed its priorities from pushing out
>apps or competing in the app space when they want people instead to use
>their services. In the last two years they’ve made this more explicit,
>killing off Chrome-browser apps and Picasa amongst other things. I’m
>amazed Google Earth is still around.
> >OneNote and Microsoft To-Do are the alternative lock-in attempt by
>Microsoft, more emulating Apple’s ecosystem approach, while Google goes
>its own way.

The way I see it, Google is challenging Apple and MS at nearly every level, though not always in the most visible or apparent way.

Chrome OS, the operating system is at the heart of this, with Chromebooks replacing PCs and iPads in the education system, with the G Suite challenging MS Office and 365, and with the integration/merger of Chrome OS with Android (and possibly Fuschia replacing either or both), also challenging iOS and Windows.

I think Google is more interested in providing the OS than specific apps (other than the crucial parts of the G Suite). So in the note-taking world it’s more likely that independent app developers will be coming up with the more interesting solutions, often integrated with the aforementioned education market (which is a huge wave of users moving through the US education system right now, just arriving at university and wondering why on earth their profs are asking them to submit MS Word documents).

Examples of these are Kami, the PDF reader and annotator, or Squid, the Android app, which convertible Chromebook users are adopting for taking notes with a stylus.

This Chromebook user base is going to be so huge (given the size of the US education system), that app developers sooner or later are going to start paying more attention to Chromebook-compatible web apps and Android apps.

There are already signs that businesses are starting to get on the G Suite band wagon (and all we need to wait is for another 4-5 years when the current US university students will enter the business world), so that could be the next wave of adoption.

I’m not really seeing anything from Apple or MS to indicate that they are ready for this new world. It seems that they’re still focused on milking their cash cows than adjusting to this new reality.

Posted by Paul Korm
Apr 22, 2018 at 07:24 PM

I would agree with that with regard to Apple, but not Microsoft. Microsoft’s play is the corporate enterprise, as is Google’s, with software-as-a-service (the O365 constellation which is far broader than the Office apps consumers think of), and infrastructure- and platform-as-a-service built on Azure. The combo of all these things make transition away from the Microsoft family a very expensive proposition. Same for the similar offerings from Google. So enterprises that align on G-suite don’t want to migrate toward MS.

Just as in the old days of 1990 when companies aligned their enterprise solutions on IBM or Unisys and few others, today the play is cloud+software and both MS and Google are equally aggressive. The consumer market for them is gravy, but also costly to support on a per-customer basis so you’re not going to see a lot of innovation in that domain.

Apple has nothing to offer for large commercial or government enterprises and is losing the small share it had with iOS to G-devices or M-devices. Apple has a lot of cash because it is motivated solely by economic rent-seeking—so it demands higher prices. That’s not a recipe for sustainable success. Consumers seem to be tiring of the same-old same-old devices. No doubt there will be disruption in the next five years or so that will make Apple consider sub-letting part of that nice spaceship headquarters it just built.

Dr Andus wrote:

>I’m not really seeing anything from Apple or MS to indicate that they
>are ready for this new world. It seems that they’re still focused on
>milking their cash cows than adjusting to this new reality.
> >

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