Microsoft douses Office NGO flash

Microsoft has forced a number of websites to pull what appears to be leaked information about the future release of its Office.Net suite.

An extensive Flash presentation on Microsoft's next release of Office, Office NGO, found its way onto the web this week.

Two websites publishing the presentation have since been contacted by the software giant concerning the "posting of an unauthorised release of a Microsoft concept piece", and have since pulled the flash presentation.

According to reports, the presentation appeared in late March and had taken a few weeks to filter through the web before Microsoft noticed it had escaped.

The presentation suggests that consumers can buy Office.Net or Office NGO, which some have speculated is an acronym for Next Generation Office, in a variety of flavours.

One offering includes only the online services; to actually use these services, you would have to buy the Office Professional suite separately.

"Once you have purchased the suite, you can use it for as long as you like, just as you do today," reads the blurb in the presentation. "However, updates and upgrades to the Office suite are not included with the subscription."

Two other versions offer an annual subscription to both online services and a subscription version of the suite. When the one-year subscription expires, customers can either renew, purchase an upgrade or do nothing, in which case Office can only view and print documents.

Features seem to be geared towards a remote workspace, with options to send and receive faxes from your inbox, store documents online, securely share documents with others and set different levels of access to a 'team workspace' for viewing and editing privileges.

Jim Adams, webmaster at one of the sites that posted the sneak preview, said that Microsoft could stand to rake it in from service fees if the subscription model takes off. In the past Microsoft's revenue has suffered from customers not upgrading their software to the latest version.

"It looks like Microsoft is going to hit the online/centralised office workspace pretty hard," said Adams. "Microsoft is going to try to centralise and combine things like multiple email accounts, alerts and documents. If large corporations buy into this, Microsoft will make a bundle on service fees."

Although the flash presentation has been pulled, screenshots of Office NGO can be seen here.