Web Biz

Writely is a free word processor, and best of all, is available wherever you are. Using web 2.0 technologies to drive a highly interactive and easy to use web application. Writely could possibly replace your need for Microsoft Word or whatever word processor you currently prefer.

Writely allows you to create new documents from scratch, or upload a document you have already. You can upload word documents, HTML and plain text documents, images, and PDF documents. Editing a document is very easy, and you can allow others to edit your documents. All changes and revisions to documents by yourself and others are stored. So, you can always roll back to a previous version if you need to.

The biggest advantage is the ability to collaborate with others on the document, as well as the ability to publish the document for all to see, or to your personal blog. For collaboration, you can invite others to edit the document. It will even notify you if someone else if editing the document. Another great feature is the ability to save a document in MS word format, RTF, PDF, or in a zip file. The last feature that I thought was great is the ability to have an RSS feed to the document in order to track revisions and changes to a document, which can be especially helpful when collaborating on a document with others in a group project. For more information about writely, visit their Frequently Asked Questions page.  The main downside to writely is obvious: unless you save the document as a word file or text file, you cannot edit the document or use writely when not connected to the internet. The other downside is the lack of valuable features, like spreadsheet and presentations integration, graphs, and other advanced features that come with an application like OpenOffice or MS Word.

I found that this tool can be extremely helpful to organizations and teams that are collaborating and working together on a document. Writely is also great for personal use, as you can keep all your document stored here, and easily browse through them by tagging your documents. It will be interesting to see how mainstream word processor applications will evolve over the next 5 years; especially as the try to compete with start-ups like writely. Writely is not the only web 2.0 word processor, there are many others that are worth taking a look at as well:

Writeboard, although it lacks the feature-rich WSIWYG editing capabilities, it integrates with backpack and basecamp  which are two great personal and business tools that are also worth looking at and made by 37 signals. Backpack allows you to store images, files, to-do lists, documents, and more, which can be shared or published. Basecamp allows for simple and easy project collaboration for organizations. Basecamp allows you to track the project’s process, create milestones, share documents, to-do lists, and lots of other information.

Jotspot is another tool similar to writely, but is similar to basecamp, in that it allows you to create a Wiki that can be used for collaboration on a project and documents. Jotspot also offers a service similar to writely, however, it is meant for multiple people editing a document at the same time, allowing you to view other people’s changes live.

Rallypoint is also very similar to basecamp and jotspot, in that it uses web 2.0 techniques to allow for easy online project collaboration to create and share pages or documents with a team, as well as a variety of other tools and features.

With so many start-ups joining the web application service model, I am looking forward to what will come out next… perhaps an online OS?

Resources:
http://www.writely.com/
http://www.basecamphq.com/
http://www.backpackit.com/
http://www.rallypointhq.com/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2005/08/31/writely-process-words-with-your-browser/
http://www.techcrunch.com/index.php?s=writeboard