I received my Ph.D. in Physics from The City University of New York. My areas of interest are in the angular momentum of light, web technology, and alternative energy sources.
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7th July 2009

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Bait and Switch? -OR Just- Realistic monetization?

Google Apps for a domain, a service that lets users that own a domain, like say Sztul.com, host email (gmail style), a calander, online documents, a start page and more is now a paid service.

If you go to http://google.com/apps you will see that now it costs $50/user per year after a 30 day free trial.  It used to be free (as in beer) for up to 50 users. hmmm…

I guess I am glad I have several domains setup with them already so I seemingly don’t have to pay for anything (as of now).

On the one hand I think it makes sense to have this service as a freemium service (ie a free version and a paid version) BUT I will end this post with saying GOOD FOR GOOGLE! In reality they SHOULD charge for this service.  It is a valuable set of tools (an online Word, Powerpoint, Outlook etc) and $50 / user / year is the going rate I guess.

Tagged: googleappsfreemiumpaidinternet

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