With Google's acquisition of Writely, I really find it hard to swallow that Microsoft is just going to bite the dust in a matter of months like everyone seems to be predicting. Microsoft has a death grip on the Office market, just like Apple does with the iPod market, and it will take an awful lot of kicking and screaming to get the entire world to switch over to Google's Writely. It's not even who has the better product that is the key factor here, it is more a matter of familiarity and entrenchment. If you ask anyone in my office, or most offices in the country, regardless of if they use mac or PC, and they will tell you they use word, and secondly "what is Writely?" Even if Google outsmarts Microsoft in some key arenas like search and click-driven marketing, they will mostly likely never be able to throw down the current king of the hill. Unless corporate America grows some organic tech-savvy in jars and downloads it to all their people overnight, I just don't see it.

Don't get me wrong, I use Writely extensively, and it is one of the best Web 2.0 apps out there, but I will never stop using Word. It is too powerful and too everywhere. Google should be trying to best Microsoft where they can, not where there is a snowball trying to make it big in the land of burning sulfur.