November 3, 2006

Google allows to open XLS attachment in GMail with google spreadsheet !!

You can see in the screenshot how Gmail suggests to open attached XLS (Microsoft Excel) files in Google Spreadsheets. I’m not sure if everyone can see this feature yet.

I guess we can expect much more of this cross-integration to be rolled out in the future... every little step can build Google’s strength in terms of lock-in*. E.g. when you are hooked on Gmail, using Google Spreadsheets suddenly becomes much more convenient, even when you might not prefer it over a competitor’s spreadsheets app; the same can work for each of their products, like web search, Google News, Google Talk and so on. Personally as user I don’t care right now ’cause I like how the usability of Google’s “office suite” is coming along, but I wonder if one day Google will face monopoly charges, pressuring them to always offer different vendors – like they already do for maps, as the screenshot below shows.