NEW YORK (Fortune Magazine) -
Imagine the challenge faced by the Microsoft Corporation as it tries to convince people to buy Microsoft Office 2003, the latest edition -- or, more accurately, the six latest editions -- of the most widely used office productivity software tool in the world.
Office 2003 Standard Edition, which went on sale last week, is composed of several core applications: the Word 2003 word processor; the Excel 2003 spreadsheet; Outlook 2003 for e-mail, calendar, contacts and task management; and PowerPoint 2003 for torturing innocent colleagues and strangers with tedious business presentations.
Fancier and more expensive editions of Office 2003 include all the core apps plus the Access 2003 database manager; Publisher 2003 for making brochures, fax cover sheets, and other printed things; Business Contact Manager for, uh, managing business contacts; and "the new Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003 tools for sharing information by means of creating rich, dynamic Extensible Markup Language (XML)-based forms."
When was the last time you daydreamed about getting a shiny new disk of software from Microsoft? It's not quite the same as getting a new car. (For one thing, when you get a new car you don't assume that it's going to crash every day.) When was the last time you said to yourself, "Darn, my old version of Word XP sure is a clunker. It's about time to trade it in."
If you think your gleaming new disk of Office 2003 apps will attract crowds of admiring gawkers when you unveil it in your cubicle, you need to get out more.
More likely, you don't use even half of the features already built into your current version of Office. Microsoft would like everyone on the planet to cough up $149 to $499 for one of the new editions of Office, but the fact is that most people are happy -- well, tolerably satisfied, at least -- with the version of Office they already own.
And the fact is that, for the vast majority of humans on the planet, Office 2003 does not qualify for "must have" status. There are dozens if not hundreds of improvements, but with a few exceptions -- mainly of interest to large corporations with thousands of employees -- they fall into the nicer cupholder, satellite radio, and optional navigation system category.
I've been using Office Professional Edition 2003 for a while now, which is a real waste because I work in a one-person office. Office Pro 2003 was designed for -- let's quote Microsoft here -- "the most demanding and sophisticated enterprise business environment."
My office is hardly sophisticated, and not just because it lacks air conditioning, smells of fried circuit boards, and looks like the aftermath of a tornado in Santa's Workshop. It is unsophisticated in the sense that I have no reason to "create and author Information Rights Management content," work with "customer-defined XML schemas," or do whatever it is one does with SharePoint List Control.
Maybe worth the money
So here's why I might consider spending $239 to $329 to upgrade from my current version of Office to Office 2003:
Outlook is better.
It has a new design called Reading Pane that makes it easier to gather, read, and manage e-mail. If you get as much e-mail as I do, any tools and tricks for streamlining the mail process may be worth the couple hundred bucks. It took a while to get used to the new layout of the Outlook mail screen, but in the end it makes it easier than before to sift and sort mail, manage multiple accounts, scan the inbox, and read mail. Nice addition: it's now easier to arrange messages by subject or "threads," which is welcome when you work in a bureaucracy. Office 2003 also has new tools for reducing spam and dangerous e-mail attachments.
Word 2003 is marginally better.
The highlight is a new feature called Reading Layout, which allows multipage documents to be arranged like pages of an open book, side by side. As more and more desktop and notebook monitors go widescreen, Reading Layout is going to be a popular feature. I have yet to see someone using a Tablet PC in the wild, but for those who own a Tablet PC, Microsoft has enhanced Word 2003 with broader "ink" capabilities for annotating documents via pen.
PowerPoint 2003 is, depending on your point of view, better or more dangerous.
In the better category, it adds a thesaurus to help Pee-Pee users come up with more interesting words for their slides. In the dangerous category, it greatly simplifies the process of incorporating video, graphics, and audio into Pee-Pee presentations. Again, there are scribble-on-the-screen enhancements for the Tablet PC user.
And, uh, that's it for me. Worth the price of an upgrade?
Only if someone else is buying.
However, Office 2003 could be worth its weight in gold for businesses that regularly send documents over intranets or exchange complex documents with clients and customers. There are many new features designed to protect documents from unauthorized viewing or changes -- the author can grant permission to select individuals or groups, inside or outside the company -- but of course to take full advantage of these so-called rights-management features, users will have to have Office 2003.
Best deals
The best deal for home users -- for those who qualify -- is Microsoft Office Student and Teacher Edition 2003. It's the same program as Office Standard Edition 2003, with Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint, but it costs $149 instead of $399.
There are two catches. One is that someone in the home has to be a student or teacher. The other is that Student and Teacher Edition cannot be upgraded down the line.
On the other hand, there are two pluses: Neither Microsoft nor its retailers are going to check your ID to see if you're a student or teacher. Microsoft has had enough trouble with its public image without busting consumers for lying about their student status. The other bonus is that a copy of Student and Teacher Edition can be installed on up to three different PCs in the home. (Microsoft realizes that Mom and Dad don't necessarily want Junior always using their computer to do his homework.)
Overall, Office 2003 is an admirable upgrade to an already successful and popular program. Microsoft is going to spend half a billion dollars in coming months to persuade you to buy it, or upgrade to one of the 2003 versions. For most consumers, it'll be a tough sell.
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