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Writely Once Again
Looks like Google has finally opened the doors to new Writely accounts.
[Hat tip to Grace]
Looks like Google has finally opened the doors to new Writely accounts.
[Hat tip to Grace]
Brilliant. It just happened this week–I was using it Sunday and it still wasn’t available for mass consumption. I note it is still in beta.
Aren’t all G. products?
I would caution using this for confidential documents just yet until the assurances about security can be verified – I looked and can’t find any site that does this one the web, and it doesn’t appear to be on any of the Canadian law society/bar websites. It would still I think be best to encrypt the documents and use digital signatures.
While Writely was closed, I used Zohowriter which I thought was excellent. I even wrote a text regarding Web 2.0 in collaboration with Patrick Cormier. It is an excellent tool and Zoho offers a complete suite of tools!!
Regarding the security issue raised by campbell, Writely states that:
“How secure are my documents?
Very! We take security very seriously. A layered security architecture ensures that only people you authorize can view or modify a document.”
Given that the deep pocket behind Writely is Google, I suspect it is indeed “very secure”… However, IF you review the terms of use, you’ll realise that, in the waiver, you agreed that:
“YOUR USE OF GOOGLE SERVICES IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK. (…)”, bla bla bla
but more precisely that:
“GOOGLE AND PARTNERS DO NOT WARRANT THAT (…) GOOGLE SERVICES WILL BE (…) SECURE, (…)”!!!
I have no doubt ;-) about the legality of such a clause given the representations made…
I use it for professional development writing and collaborative projects rather than client-related work. To be honest, I would also avoid email and cell phones for most client work. But people don’t seem too worried about that these days.