Google Docs has kept the functionality of the two products intact while adopting the simplified look-n-feel of Google Spreadsheets. The next logical step would be to merge some of the functionality of each application…adopt discussions in the document (ex-Writely) section and give the collaboration/publish functionality to spreadsheets. (yeah yeah, you can already collaborate with spreadsheets, but the collaboration is limited)

I’m excited to see what pans out with all of this. Oh, and as a side note, I see that Google has added a ‘Photos‘ link to the quick-nav at the top of Google Docs. Google is finally pushing Picasa…interesting.

Over the past month, we’ve been pretty excited about the whole Web 2.0 craze. The initial release was fairly solid but it lacked a few key elements to make it a 2.0 application. The three of us have wanted to bring MasterWish fully into the Web 2.0 world, so with a great deal of planning and even more coding, I am comfortable to say that MasterWish is now a fairly solid Web 2.0 application.

MasterWish has:

• Folksonomy Features (tagging)
• Easy item adds via a Favelet
• Ajax for quick and easy assignments of items to lists, buddies to groups, buddies to your buddy list, copying items from other people, etc.
• Buddies/Contacts
• Group-Level access to Categorized Wish Lists
• Fine-grained access control on your user information (so you can distribute information to people on a case by case basis). Here are some things you can distribute to other users:
  • Real Name
  • Address
  • E-mail
  • Many clothing sizes (shirt, bra, inseam, ring, head, etc)
  • Color Preference
  • etc.

Currently we are working on a very sweet feature to allow for collaborative lists. This will make wedding registries a LOT easier and my office at Plymouth State (which currently uses MasterWish for book orders) will be able to create an office wishlist and allow multiple users to contribute.

Christmas is coming around the corner, so if you haven’t checked it out for your wishlist needs, you should do so. You definately won’t regret it…and your family will thank you for it!