[JKT]

Things Apple needs to do to make this a success rather than a tremendous failure:

1. Keep it dirt-cheap for the base amount of server space and make it free to MobileMe subscribers.

Prospects of this actually happening - nil.

2. Make access for colleagues to download and comment on documents free.

Prospects of this actually happening - this should be a no-brainer, but I'll rate it so, so for now as I have no faith in Apple not to try and rape its customers for as much money as they possibly can even though it damages their online offerings and number of subscribers.

3. Permit third party apps to hook into and use the system, e.g. other word processors, MS Office, etc. so that they too can upload their own file formats to the system for commenting and download.

Prospects of this actually happening - nil.

4. Improve it so that commenting added online is exported to all other file formats and not just the iWork file formats when they are downloaded (the intro movie for iWork.com at Apple indicates that they will only be added to e.g. Pages documents and not the PDF or Word downloads).

Prospects of this actually happening - you would hope it would be high, but the reality?

5. Make it support ODF for crying out loud!

Prospects of this actually happening - nil.

Sadly, I doubt that I am going to be surprised to see an Apple press statement declaring success for iwork.com at the end of this year, with huge numbers of subscribers for the service as it actually looks as though it would be a useful one for everyone to be able to use.

[mduell]

My guesses:
1. No.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. No.
5. No.

[Art Vandelay]

http://www.apple.com/feedback/iwork-dot-com.html

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by mduell 

My guesses:
1. No.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. No.
5. No.

Agreed.

AFAICS, you don't even need an Apple ID to access and comment others' documents - the probability of requiring a paid subscription is very small. It would probably kill the service.

My guess is that being able to publish on iWork.com will be $30/year, and $10/year for MobileMe subscribers.

[slugslugslug]

AppleInsider just did a little guided tour of the beta, and it looked like, no, you don't need a membership to view/comment on documents, just to post them.

But then, as it stands now, you can't actually edit anything on iWork.com. Which seems to really take away any reason to pay for it. There are far too many free ways to share files for this to be worth extra money to anyone, unless I'm missing something huge.

[Spheric Harlot]

The commenting/invitation/auto-convert/single-click integration with iWork is very very slick.

And if comments actually get synced back down into the document on your machine, that's an *extremely* elegant way to get feedback/approval for your stuff should you regularly require it.

[Ted L. Nancy]

If not free to MobileMe subscribers... wow, that's just pathetic.

If they blow me off after I've been on .Mac since the early days (iTools), I'll be beyond disappointed.

Are you listening Apple?

[JKT]

Well, its free for everyone at the moment ;-) but I seriously doubt it will be or MobileMe users once it does become pay for...

Thanks slugslugslug - you have added number 6 that I missed out:

6. The ability to edit documents online (with or without tracked changes).

Another no-brainer if this service is actually going to be anything close to a success.

[slugslugslug]

Yeah, actually, I took a look at it today and really can't imagine who'd want to bother, with the feature set as it is now. And there's no indication that they're adding any new features. That syncing Spheric Harlot mentioned might be cool, but it doesn't happen. If you download a file (I only tried a Pages doc), the comments (but not the "notes") show up in Pages format, but not in PDF or Word. Which is pretty dumb, since Pages can export comments into a .doc (I imagine that will actually get added in there).

Overall, it seems barely worth using instead of e-mail, even while it's free. Maybe if you're going to be collaborating on lots and lots of files, but it seems like there are better options out there.