Microsoft Office Live Small Business

We use OLSB for hosting our school website and for email.  Will the cost be $6 per email account per month, if all you want is email and web hosting?  What if you only want web hosting (with the online web editing tools) and nothing else?

OMG

NOW we know why there is so little help for THIS platform !!!

OLSB, like other Microsoft products we utilize < our OLSB blogs for example> are being FAZED OUT ! ( for cloud computing it appears)

Once again, who ARE these people that make these decisions. Has anyone who USES OLSB be asked to do a focus group, done an on-line survey... ANY of US ? I know I haven't been asked or been offered a chance to voice MY opinion !

Are we going  to get better tools to build our websites with ?

Will there be better modules and designing options/themes?

Will it be easier to update and maintain our websites ?

Just another kick in our loyal @**es it seems.

How VERY generous to offer us a few months free during the transition. I admit the $6 a month fee isn't a lot compared to other hosting sites, but what will WE, the user, get that will improve our sites for functionality, usability ?

From what I see above, most of these "new improvments" are things I would never, ever need for my small business. How about small business apps that help me with invoices. Now THAT I could use! How about that module that all us Bloggers want. A Wordpress module, not that "paste some HTML in a box here & you have a blog!" junk. That is a JOKE !!

How about asking US what WE want and actually LISTENING and IMPLEMENTING our ANSWERS !!!!

Hmmmm...

I now step down from my soapbox & hand the mike over to the next disgruntled OLSB user !!!

Bewitching

< I may just have to whip out a hex or two before this is all said & done !! >

If this goes through as a mandatory replacement, then it will be exceptionally obvious as to how little that Microsoft cares about it's customers.  I refuse to convert and if this is my only option, then my domain will expire next year.  I don't know who's magnificent idea that this was, but it is wrong, and if they think people were upset over the wordpress conversion, they have an all new level of disapproval coming.

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God saved me.

I am shifted to wordpress. It will be a mess when my account will be dead, Lot of my tutorials are posted elsewhere with image hosted in OSLB.

All are for MS products/services.

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I think you should keep a free version of this, because not a lot of people who use OLSB will want to start paying for it. I don't mind if it has limited features, because it would be better than nothing and I don't use many of the features.

The main thing that made me join OLSB was that I could create a website for free. If I will have to pay for this, then I will find a new place to host my site.

I have been with OLSB as a website owner for little over a year and I have read hundreds of postings here - asking why doesn't OLSB had this or have that. So many complaints that you can't do this or you can't do that with OLSB.

They are not making any money on this service, NONE. They don't sell advertisements that they display on my site. They don't charge for business e-mail accounts. They are a re-seller of domain names  from a place that charges more than twice the amount. They have a support team with expenses.  This is a business model that has to die. Now of us could stay in business operating like that.

If you have 20 minutes, you must watch this video.

channel9.msdn.com/.../Office-365-The-power-to-think-big-and-be-small-to-be-big-and-act-fast

Now, they are giving you what a lot were asking for.  Many, many new tools and features like MS Access Database that can operate on your site, Built in blog, Add content right from MS Word, Add OneNote Pages for anyone to view, Slide presentation right from PowerPoint, On-line Whiteboard, all kinds of social networking integration ...

I can't wait for it to happen and I hope they let me participate in the beta.

Remember, they are not shutting down until a year from now. That is a long time for you to make plans.

Here is something to start  40 Places Where You Can Create Your Websites Online For Free:

                     www.webdesignbooth.com/places-where-you-can-create-websites-online

    I would find it hard to believe that Microsoft is the one and only reseller on the internet who makes no money.  There are lots of places where the resellers sell products and services cheaper than the original providers, and make a lot of money at it.  Resellers get rates, and based on the number of users that Microsoft OL has I would say that they have a good one.

    The surveys that Microsoft sends out are very vague, and have changed little if any over the last 3 years.  I find it very hard to believe that a lot of the users of OLSB will be able to make use of these extra services.  I guarantee you could send out a survey and ask if any of the users even know what is cloud computing, and most will not know what it is, much less be able to use it.

    My question is why does it have to be one or the other?  Why can't the two services operate side by side?  They will obviously be two separate services during the beta process.  I have been a member of OLSB since it was the beta version and the domains were "free forever".  I have watched the disappearance of lots of services associated with my business account which is fine from a provider of free hosting, but this forced transition to have to pay for things that I do not and will not need is too much.  I am sure that there are lots of people who can use a service like this, but I doubt it includes the people handcrafting jewelry in their spare time, or the landscaper, tree removal service, leather repair service, carpenters, churches, or any of the many non-profit organizations who have found a home here.  

    This is a mistake that will meet with lots of disapproval.  Those of us who participate here have a heads up on the situation, but lets be honest, most of the users of this service built their websites, and now just check their e-mail, and therefore will know nothing of this situation until Microsoft finally decides to inform them.  When that happens, the forum will probably blow up with dissatisfied customers.

If and when Microsoft does start charging for my website hosting; I will move on to another free provider.  My business is very small.  I build simple effective and cheap websites for customers who are very small businesses. I teach them to manage it themselves.  Thanks for the heads-up.  I will start finding another free website hosting service.

One would think that Microsoft would be interested in continuing an entry level, free, hosting service.  Ya just never know what little business will make it BIG and want to continue with MSFT products as a paying customer.

Which, I am now a little bigger and looking for a contact manager.  OL Contacts crashes.  Think I will not waste my time 'fixing' it. . .just move on.

Al tiempo que se anunciaba el lanzamiento de la beta de Office 365 , el Access Team Blog anunciaba que

Annie Akin,

    I do apologize if I have coma across as a disgruntled customer.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I am merely a frustrated website owner.  I realize that there are lots of other service providers who offer basically the same service, but I have become familiar with both the service, and the community.  I have seen every single website that has been put up for review over the last year and a half, and have offered assistance to most of them.  If I was not satisfied with the service then I would not have found the desire to participate in either forum in the community.  However, I do not believe that most of the ones that I have seen will be able to make use of these services.

    If OL was not as easy as it is, then there are a lot of us (myself included) who would not have a website.  Based on the number of Help sites available through the forum one can deduce that there are a lot of satisfied users.  I am not even suggesting that you keep free websites, or necessarily free hosting, but just as others here have asked, a lower level service package to satisfy small business owners such as myself.  My website is little more than a portfolio.  I do not need to share anything with my employees or my customers that can not be accomplished through e-mail.  A lot of people have put a lot of work into their online presence, but I would imagine that I will not be the only one who will balk at this conversion, whether based on financial reasons or principle.  

WoW,

I opened a OLSB website because of the ease of use and the community support (I like Microsoft products).

I think I have setup a good non-profit website for our community (wynnwoodhoa.community.officelive.com) and being non-profit I still used the officelive.com name.

It’s a good thing that it will be next year when we are forced to find another great free service (don't think so) cause it took me months to make all of the pages and find/setup the scripts, and it will take me even longer to try and copy everything (pages and scripts) before its gone.

Thanks for the memories...

I just noticed that I have over 150 web pages and around 30 lists...

Guess I will be busy.

WebMaster

Wynn Wood HOA (wynnwoodhoa.community.officelive.com)

We are a volunteers-organization building websites for other volunteersorganizations. To encourage the end-user to be self-supporting in placing content we now use the simple CMS: "My Web Pages Starter Kit" from MS (free) and use VWD to deploy the sites. That will do.

The last months we are investing in OLSB and its really fantastic! Of course we will pay for hosting but 6euro/month/organization is too much. We would ask you to lower the price for only hosting. Or is it better for us to build an web application on Azure ?

    Just to let you know, I tried to watch the video presented in Microsoft silverlight (and my silverlight applications are fully upgraded), about Microsoft Office 365 using Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 (fully updated), on a machine running Microsoft windows 7 (fully updated) and when I went to view in full screen, silverlight crashed, taking the browser with it, and, unable to access task manager, the operating system crashed as well.

    I have just restarted my computer and have made sure to come here and register my faith in Microsoft's products and how well they work together.  And to all those in support of this new conversion (or at least the one anyway), just remember that all of these services are a mere editing of terms and conditions away from disappearing as we have been witness to in the past.

    In addition, it seems that there are more questions being answered here than at the article posted by OLSBCADM, where people were asked to post questions.  Does anyone know if they will be answered soon, or at all?  And, do any of the comments on the articles and blogs put forth by Microsoft's representatives, and commented on by users of OLSB count as feedback, or are those doors closed?

Unfortunately, it seems that you've missed the fact that there is a very large market of small businesses who only need a web host and business email solution.  The other items in OL365 are almost certain to be overkill for all of this folks.  What certainly is clear is that Microsoft cannot be counted on to provide solid, long-term cloud-based solutions, e.g., OL Workspace was degraded to SkyDrive, Spaces was abandoned and users were sent into the waiting arms of the vastly superior WordPress.  OLSB was a very compelling platform for relatively quick and easy website development and I think a nominal cost for the service would be entirely acceptable.  For those who only need a website and email, perhaps $2 or $3 per month (comparable to the cost from plenty of other website hosts).  We understand that the OL365 platform isn't going to offer different usage options so every user will have to cough up the $6 per month for all services most of which they aren't going to use.  Thanks to OLSB, I've picked up enough website development skills to be able to shift to more solid platforms (certainly not OLSB or OL365 and OLWhateverIsNext).  In all likelihood, OL365 (or OLWhateverIsNext) will die entirely in less than five years and all current OLSB users should  start making plans to abandon the platform sooner rather than later.  Annie, perhaps you could write another post providing details on how users can (1) get their domain registration information from Melbourne IT so that they can move to another registrar; and (2) download as much of their website information as possible so that they can reconstruct their sites on another platform that will actually exist a few years from now which OL365 most certainly will not.

(OLSB customers are free to remove their domain for use with OLSB at any time.) ..lots of hard works.

Please don't do that......give us options ...1 and 2.

I'm sensing from all of these responses that my personal/professional writer website is going to be transferred to a new entity that will increase my charges from the current $15 per year to $72.  Is that correct?  Or does the transition referred to concern other website entities?

And I totally agree that, for those of us who have only basic website needs for a personal/professional -- but not active business -- website, the added "features" -- considering the cost -- are not worthwhile at all, as I am unlikely to use most of them.  And in particular if there are other less costly mechanisms to pursue to keep the website name intact.

Don't forget you are making us all gun-shy, having invited us to have a totally free website for a few years and then asked for a "token" $15 only last year.  Now, in the space of a year -- though you've given us a year's grace period -- you are upping the cost almost five-fold.  Can any of us really have the confidence that the rug will not be pulled out from under us again in another couple of years?

So, as already asked by others, if the end is nigh in a little over a year, is there a way to keep our website name with a different hosting company and, if so, will we have to cut and paste everything one by one, assuming we want to, at the least, duplicate our current content?  And I presume that also includes all of the stored emails?

No question, this is quite a shock and I, too, wonder how the "survey" was conducted, if in fact there truly was one outside the Microsoft board room?

Russnow

    actually the $72 per year per user only refers to the hosting.  The $15 was the cost of domain renewal which it is unclear as to whether this will be a continuing program into the 365 conversion.  If not you will have to move your domain to another registrar or pay something like $35 to renew with Melbourne IT where it is probably currently registered.  Either way the total cost would be the sum of the two.  As far as moving your website to a different host, Microsoft uses a proprietary file type (.OLP) which will not convert to any other hosts system so wherever you go, you will have to completely rebuild your website.  Your e-mail accounts will be deleted and unless something changes, I am pretty sure you will be unable to recreate them, even with another host, for 270 days.  

Thanks, Willie B, but I am assuming that the $15 will be part of the $72 or they would have said so, although, having just written that, considering the way they've handled all this, nothing would surprise me.

However, if we chucked MS and it costs, let's say $35 to renew with Melbourne IT, is that only for the domain (this is all so new and I'm still on a learning curve about websites)?  In other words would we would still have to find another hosting organization which, together with the domain situation, would be far more costly than the MS offer?  That doesn't seem sensible either.

I imagine, unless there are other more economical servers out there, including the domain name, we would have to hold our nose and stick with MS Word or frankly, depending upon our personal needs, just say "It was fun while it lasted" and let our websites disappear.

Many thanks.

www.ramproductionsinternational.com

@russnow

To add to what Willie B wrote, the $15 domain registration fee (through Melbourne IT) is not related to the site hosting fee (through Microsoft) which will move from the current free hosting model to $6 per month when OL365 arrives.  I think it is entirely reasonable for MS to charge a nominal fee for its site hosting service (particularly if that fee will result in support services that push beyond the current range of laughable to fairly poor).  The problem is that, as we normally see with MS, they've finally figured out that the market they really want is the business professional and not the mom-and-pop shop who just needs not much more than a "calling card" website and related email account.  OL365 could, for serious businesses, be a very compelling platform and for $6 a month would be very hard to match (presuming it all works as intended which with MS is not really a certainty).  The OL website development tools as they currently exist would need to be substantially beefed up and there will probably have to be a greater adherence to proper web coding standards than some of the silly stuff that OLSB has now.  I believe that Willie B is entirely correct in stating that, if you really have no potential interest in all of the new functionalities of OL365 (which will likely be true of the majority of OLSBers), then you should begin to plan for a full reconstruction of your website on another platform.  To that end, I checked out Weebly.com which provides free hosting.  They have really pretty templates (far superior to the eye-searingly ugly OLSB templates) and an AJAX-based page editor that makes the OLSB page editor look like something from the Jurassic era.  I constructed a test 4-page website with embedded YouTube videos, a full blog, images, links, and a nice contact form in about 3 hours.  For those of us who can write raw HTML and CSS, well, that's available for modification too.  There is no forced advertising and the only major "drawback" is the small "Create a free website with Weebly" footer.  For most folks this isn't going to be an issue since they're getting free hosting (you can get rid of that footer by upgrading to the "Pro" subscription for $5 a month).  You may wish to consider going through the process of moving your domain from Melbourne IT to another company like Godaddy and then reconstructing your site on Weebly (or another free host of your choice).  I have clients for whom OL365 might be very interesting but many clients for whom Weebly or WordPress or some other host will be a far better choice than OLSB/OL365.

Thanks, Delta SleepClinic, but are you absolutely sure that the $72 will not absorb the $15 fee we now have to pay?  I mean, they made a big point of the changeover last year after the hosting and domain name -- the whole deal -- had been free as to why they were suddenly charging.  Why wouldn't they use the word "additional" if they were in fact going to throw this at us in another year as an add-on to the domain fee, or else they would presumably have another firestorm as they are getting now?

However, to your other and more germane point.  If this is true -- that in effect we'd have to pay $87 (host and domain combined) and even that assuming that the "discounted" domain fee wasn't raised to what Willie B thought would normally be $35 if we went to Melbourne IT by ourselves, when did all this become separate?  The $15 I paid last year and presumably would pay again in January was paid to Microsoft, not to Melbourne IT and so I guess MS must have a deal or is subsidizing us.

And finally, how easy is it to take our website name with us?  Whom do we contact?  Do we get the other domain server first and ask them to pull it from Melbourne or must we inform Melbourne first?  It's very confusing and, no matter where we wind up, we have to presume that the free host such as Weebly might pull the rug out from under us next year or soon after.  Just like some of you may remember using information with the phone company used to be free.

Last thing, do you happen to know how much Godaddy (the alternative to Melbourne IT that you mentioned) costs and indeed how much Melbourne IT would cost if MS wasn't involved?

Many thanks.

Michael

www.ramproductionsinternational.com

@russnow

Michael, the $6 per month hosting fee that MS will charge when OL365 goes live a year or so from now is independent of the domain registration fee of $15 per year that you pay now.  That $15 fee is paid to the domain registrar, Melbourne IT not Microsoft,  Melbourne IT are the ones you have to deal with to get your domain information.  You'll need to get your domain registry key (see the information at this post: ask.officelive.com/.../95283.aspx).  Once you have the key, you'll be able to access all your domain information and can elect to move to another registrar if you wish.  Not sure about the registrar fee amount of $35 per year that Willie B mentioned.  If that's what Melbourne IT charges, you can pay less elsewhere (Godaddy, for example charges around $11 per year for regular registration or around $20 per year if you go for private registration).  In any event, you'll ultimately need to have access to your domain information so that you can redirect your custom domain from your existing OLSB website to the new one that you'll reconstruct with another host.  Once you have your access to your registrar account, you can either stay with Melbourne IT or give Godaddy (or whichever registrar you want) a call and they'll assist with the domain transfer.  That transfer should not affect the situation with your existing OLSB site (you'll have a different registrar for your custom domain but the domain will still point to your OLSB hosted site).  Then you rebuild your site with another host.  I mentioned Weebly but, if you're queasy about the long-term viability of a free hosted situation, you need to contemplate the best paid service.  Many domain registrars also provide hosting services for a fee and they typically have site construction tools for folks who don't know HTML or CSS (Godaddy, for example does).  You can also consider a very solid free host like WordPress (go to WordPress.com not WordPress.org).  While WordPress is the de facto standard for blogging sites (as previously mentioned, MS is deep-sixing Windows Live Spaces and all Spaces customers are being migrated to WordPress which tells you how strong they are), you can in fact build a non-blogging site if you wish.  The back-end is not quite as slick as Weebly and there's probably a steeper learning curve but it is very good nonetheless.  WordPress will host your site for free at a WordPress URL (e.g., yoursite.wordpress.com) or you can map your custom domain to the free site and pay an annual fee of $12.  If you want to customize your site's CSS (in order to use your own custom style rather than one of the available WordPress free templates), that's another $15 per year.  Chances are, you'll use one of the templates so all you'll need is the custom domain mapping and the cost for your site would then be just $12 per year plus the cost of your domain registrar which, as previously mentioned, can be expected to be somewhere in the range of $11-20 per year (so all in all, this route could be as cheap as two bucks per month).  The chances of WordPress going defunct anytime soon is pretty remote given its status as the premiere blogging platform.

Hope this helps.

Paul M.

@russnow

Michael, I just took a look at your site and it looks as though you in fact would do very well using a proper blogging platform to house your content.  Currently, you are essentially creating detailed "posts" in completely separate web pages.  What you really want to do is create a site potentially with several blogs (one for your "reactions" and another for your "travel tips" and so on).  Either Weebly or WordPress would be ideal choices for you and from a style perspective, your new site under either of these hosting platforms will certainly have a vastly more polished appearance than the default OLSB theme that you are currently using.

Paul M.

Many thanks, Paul, and I appreciate your taking the time to give my site a look.

The "reactions" are mostly reprints of articles I have written for The Huffington Post, which, of course, has a place for comments on those pieces on its site.  I also sometimes get emails to my website address, which is linked to the Huff Post articles and presumably those are from Huff Post readers who don't want to register with Huff Post to make a comment.  It is also possible, but less likely, that someone has happened upon my article at the website itself and used the "Contact Us" feature in that manner.

I'm not sure I require blogging potential on my website, i.e. as if the articles were originated there and people who found them would make comments for the reasons cited above.  But it's always an option.  And, as for a "vastly more polished appearance," you are absolutely correct, as the limitations we are dealing with do not give us great choices or possibilities.  Not to mention the "crashes" when I post something.  I'll put something on and it won't save and I have to do the whole thing again.  Or it will leave a huge hole at the bottom of the page instead of framing it as most of them do.

Anyway, all things to consider and I will do a lot of research in the time we have to do so.  I did click on the domain registry key link you provided, but all it did was link me to a list of questions that recent users have posted about different subjects.  I then did a search using domain registry key and it pulled up some articles, the most recent in the spring.

I do hope it's not a horribly cumbersome process to get the website transferred from Melbourne to another, but I'm sure I will be able to figure it out in the time left.

I also note that our friend AnnieAkin has stopped answering, and I wonder if it's because she doesn't read the page unless things are directly replied to her.  If so, perhaps I'll cut and paste some of my questions and comments and put them into a reply window that is under her post (if that's possible).

The reason I kept harping on the $15 possibly being included is that, though the funds may well have made their way to Melbourne IT, the credit card info was to MS, and I still believe that, considering this significant change, it is hard to believe that they would not take the trouble to say, BTW, this is in addition to the new (formerly free) domain charge we started exacting last year, so it's $6 a month, plus whatever that might be in the future.

Also, it's interesting that I received no information about the 365 change.  I only learned about it by following up on the email I got about putting our blogs on Wordpress (which I eventually learned did not affect me, as my website doesn't have a blog).  If I had ignored their email for the above reason, when would I have learned about 365?  This doesn't augur well for a major communications company, which is similar to a piece I recently did about AT&T for Huff Post, the link of which is:  www.huffingtonpost.com/.../can-att-stay-in-business_b_736068.html

Thanks again.

Michael

www.ramproductionsinternational.com

@Michael

I sort of feel sorry for MS because they really do try to broaden their appeal beyond just operating systems and Office but just don't have much success at anything else (and I say this as a professional Microsoft Excel applications developer).  We all know the recent list of shame: Zune (Apple is still laughing out loud), Windows Vista (Apple is still laughing out loud), Windows Mobile (Apple is, well, you get the idea), the truly awful Office Ribbon interface (assembled apparently by chimps and not the smart ones either), Windows Live Sync/Mesh (still figuring itself out), Windows Live Workspace (degenerated to SkyDrive), Windows Live Spaces (handed over to WordPress), etc.  Originally, OLSB was truly created for small businesses but MS has finally decided that they want "bigger small businesses" and so current OLSB website users like you will just have to figure out what to do next.  As Willie B indicated, OLSB websites are stored in a proprietary format that is essentially useless for porting over to another hosting service.  It is possible that during the next year or so, MS may attempt to find another hosting provider and provide some mechanism to allow OLSB users to port their sites over if they don't want to sign up for OL365; sort of like what they did with Spaces and WordPress.  But there really aren't any guarantees.  I don't think you're going to get any answers on that from Ms. Akin or anyone else at MS since, at this point, they're all undoubtedly trying to figure out what to do next.  Don't get me wrong, OL365, if it works properly, could be a pretty big deal (like the eminently fabulous Sharepoint is) but not for folks like you.  Check out WordPress, it is very impressive and, trust me, a blog site is where you want to go.  And they do have a mechanism for you to export your site content in a form that is portable (just in case).  WordPress is open source so there is no profit motive and hence no strong inclination to drop a whole bunch of customers when someone figures out that there's actually no money in it for them.  By the way, I too found out about OL365 entirely by accident.

Paul M.

Like previous posters I only found out about this by logging on to support to find out how to add functionality to my OLSB site and am now loathe to continue to develop in OLSB. I only use the website and email services so paying for functionality I dont need or want seems unfair, a cheaper rate (or continued free even better) would be my choice or if not then a re-design elsewhere with more portability than OLP looks likely. I have encouraged at lease 3 other businesses to use OLSB so they will probably do the same as me, thats 4 people less if the strategy doesnt change..

@ChrisButler1

Chris, I think you represent the majority of current OLSB website owners.  Your needs are fairly light (standard website plus business email) and the free hosting that MS provided was really terrific.  I have been wondering for a while now when this free hosting would end and that has now been answered.  In Microsoft's defense, offering a completely free hosting service and not even requiring the "Powered by Office Live Small Business" footer was a bit of a puzzle to me (there are other free hosting services but they either force ads on to your site or at least put a promotional footer on the web pages).  So, the end of this sort of free service is not a surprise.  Given the gigantic number of OLSB subscribers that Office 365 is likely to affect, I'd be willing to bet that MS will provide some option to port your site over to another provider (like Weebly, Yola, Webs, SnapPages, etc.).  Those other providers typically have a free hosting option but will either place ads on your site or have a promotional footer if you take that option.  Paid hosting from those providers typically runs in the $5-10 per month range which is comparable to the $6 Microsoft intends to charge for Office 365.  However, if all the Sharepoint, Exchange Server, Lync, etc. functionality comes with the Office 365 package, then it could be a pretty big deal albeit for a client base somewhat different from the vast majority of the existing OLSB client base.  For most existing OLSB customers, once they get a look at how slick those other hosting solutions are versus the somewhat primitive OLSB website creator (and truly ugly themes), they won't look back.  Most of those other hosting solutions for non-web coding types have true drag-and-drop functionality, a boat load of sophisticated widgets, integrated blogging, beautiful themes, and they generate standards-compliant websites.  OLSB as it currently stands doesn't really compare to that.  On the other hand, OLSB does provide considerably greater access to site customization with custom HTML, CSS, and to some degree, Javascript (a bit kludgey though).  And the business applications (Sharepoint lists that can be rendered on your site's pages) are rather unique to OLSB.  But that may be of little interest to the majority of current OLSB subscribers.  A lot of OLSB subscribers will leave and I think MS realizes this.  Hopefully, MS will provide some way to port the majority of a site's content to another provider in the same way they did for Windows Live Spaces users who were migrated to WordPress recently.  OLSB subscribers who have small, relatively simple sites should be able to reconstruct their sites fairly quickly on another hosting platform and then simply redirect their domain to the new host.  Not much fun but such is life.

Definetely its time to move on........ It is a joke.

As a company, MS' starting point is technology not customer needs. And people don't want technology they want solutions. As I said when this was first announced, the key question about 365 is whether or not it will provide the solutions people want. In other words, is all the undeniably great technology underlying the service going to:

1/ be packaged into practical solutions people actually use (ecommerce/blogs etc)?

2/ is it going to work as promised?

OLSB has many features that few people use because they're not "point and click" solutions. As an example, we built a blogging application that leveraged the Sharepoint features of the business apps area. People want things like that to be built in and readily accessible.

Then the choice is a simple matter of dollars and cents: will 365 save them more than its 20c a day cost in time and effort? .Will the cost be offset by increased productivity?

I think for many users it could be-but only if the technology is bundled and packaged into time saving solutions. If, as with OLSB, they have to spend more time figuring out how to do things than actually doing them, I can't see it being very successful.  

apologies for the comment above. this is not what i meant to say.

Well, it's been two weeks since the announcement of Office 365 and the response is more than we could

"Microsoft Office 365 Blog  wrote What a Week!

on Mon, Nov 1 2010 3:12 PM

Well, it's been two weeks since the announcement of Office 365 and the response is more than we could......"

??More than we could WHAT I wonder?

This is a bit of a shock to the system as a very small business but with bigger ambitions for next year to which OLSB was to be part of the strategy.

My questions are as follows: -

1. I assume that the current web site would be migrated to be a public facing sharepoint  site, but will it also have my existing domain name as this is not managed by OLSB. The current domain is managed via a third party registrar and the named server record are points to office live severs would this still be the case with office 365.

2. What will happen to my existing live email account that use my domain name will mail still be point to them and will I still access them if I don’t go to Office 365.  If the later is correct  then I will have to move all the documents stored  on the related skydrives and consider how to reroute existing mail to a provider.

I have posed this question before against the article related to common questions about office 365 and OLSB however  sadly had no response to my concerns

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WeBBrewers,

    In order to get the rest of the comment you have to follow the link to the blog.  This is where you find that they perceive the feedback to be overwhelmingly positive.  Go figure.

The product soungds impressive.

Willie,

Thank you for pointing that out about the link to the blog. Reading the "official" MS line on reactions to 365 makes me wonder whether MS employees got the news that the CA proposition to legalize marijuana got defeated.  No real users have even SEEN the product yet, so where is all this gushing praise coming from?

I don't know what to say about 365, except that I am upset.  I can't believe this 'transition' is mandatory... Why not keep these 'products' separate and let customers take their pick, so to speak?  I'm happy with my current service.  From the many surveys I filled out from this company about 'how to improve services' I never asked for these things mentioned.

I have referred friends, family, churches, and other groups to your services based on the cost and functionality of MSOL, but I can not do so now unless MS decides differently.  

I am a loyal customer and webmaster, who really enjoyed MS Office Live SB, but I may have to find other solutions.  If THIS is forced, I have to wonder, what will be next?  Will technology take another leap that leads to another 'system' the following year... or two?  I spend way to much time on my websites to chance such actions.  Please, Microsoft, I beg you to reconsider your loyal customers...

I have four websites through MSOL, and have been working on completely revamping one - to find this bit of news only today, and was disheartened.  I don't make money from my websites, as of now, and I will not be able to keep them alive when this is enforced.  I really hope this is reconsidered...

Take care.

I would like to add, that I have purchased domains for my four websites (and planned on purchasing more) so I currently pay MS around $64.56 per year.  When this transition is enforced (if I chose or am able to keep them up) I will be paying $311.00 per year, which is simply beyond my budget.  Again, I ask you to consider your loyal and satisfied customers.  Take care.

This news is very disappointing. I use MS to show my artwork and allow people to email me. My sales are done via the studio and galleries. I joined Samll Business in beta when it was supposedly a free service - if I knew this was not to be the case I would have gone elsewhere. I am now considering paying someone to set up a new website as it took months and months (as a non PC person) to set up the original and I can't face doing it again. i try to like MS but all they do is kick me in the teeth. By the way does antone know - if I move my domain does my email move with me?

Wow! This is certainly disappointing. But I guess I'm not too surprised.

I don't see any benefit to staying with this service though after the free period ends. $6.00 a month might seem like a good deal to Microsoft but there are plenty of good hosts that are less than that. As for your bells and whistles, whatever they may be, I don't want to waste my time learning another "new" way to use this system and then likely have you change your stuff around again.

You were a good service. Now I'll go back to the services I had before. At least there I could FTP, run scripts, and host files right on my site instead of embedding.

I guess you get what you pay for and free things ususally are worth what you pay for them.

Sorry if I missed this. Will I have to redo my website or will it stay intact when the conversions begin?

How do you define "per user" for the cost. Is this per e-mail address? Because I have a lot of e-mails that are just used to track where a person is finding me? like INFO@... or comment@...

OMG!?!?! Glad Microsoft's servers were glitchy today and I came over here to complain about it!!!

This is the first time I've heard about this switch. Microsoft is in the gutter when it comes to keeping the people who use their products informed on what they are doing or planning to do.

I'm an old-school OLSB user. I knew nothing about building websites, much less code, before starting my website. I've been with OLSB from the very beginning...back when it was just Microsoft vs. Google that were offering free website hosting. Microsoft didn't have ads, so I went with them.

Since the early days, I've taught myself many things about coding and website design. I own a education OLSB site that does not generate ANY money. I built it from scratch! I provide teaching resources for English teachers in Japan. It is arguably the largest of its kind. The site boasts well above 2,000 pages. And, it gets an average of 2,000 teachers surfing through the site everyday; about 10,000 pages surfed every day. It's not huge, I know, but it's substantial! I have spent the greater part of three years after work donating my free time into building my site. THREE YEARS!!!

Now, I have to sit down and weigh my options very carefully. I joined OLSB because it was free. That's gone! The original platform was really buggy and it drove me bonkers but I stuck with it because it was free. Even now, the software is still buggy! I kept with OLSB even after they started charging me $15 a year because I thought it was still a great deal. But, now this is going to be gone, too! Like a previous poster wrote, who is to say Microsoft won't jack the prices again? They have not even proven themselves to listen to their users. Why should we believe anything they say now?

@AnnieAkin, I'm going to have to scream "bull$hit!" to everything you posted. Right here, right here on this thread, are REAL OLSB users. There are tons of us that are expressing our distain for the upcoming change. I have not read ONE post that is in favor of this change. Like another REAL OLSB wrote, "what polls are you talking about?" I have never been polled. I'm a real OLSB user! Throwing out general statements about "users want this" without providing proof of that statement in the blunt face of many users saying THEY DON'T WANT the change, leaves you a little short on ethos.

And, you know, who cares if people aren't using OLSB for what it was invented for, there are a ton of not-using-it-properly people out there! Has Microsoft stopped to think about the people who don't generate money from their sites?

Maybe the acronym should be changed to Office Lies $hitty Business? This is just another example of Corporate America stomping on the little people.

Definitely got to think about this one...

A few months ago, I made the decision to stop providing services for Office Live websites.  I transitioned into the WordPress.

There are many options available and if you need help transitioning - we can help!   I don't think I can promote my business link but I'll give it a shot. I am a Microsoft Partner and can help.

See me over at http://webshoo.com.  :)

R. Anthony Solis

I agree with Ken, i am excited for this change...Microsoft offers a lot i am a paying customer of 14.95 a year and the price will go up a lot but the services offered are well worth the price. If you wan to grow your business and tackl your market you need to invest a little into your business!

www.btrio.com

what???

trying to add comments

I am a small business owner and I use Office Live Small Business ONLY o create/host my web site.  I do not even use Workspaces.  AND I DO NOT NEED TO SHARE MICROSOFT OFFICE DOCUMENTS ON EVERY DEVICE IN THE FREE WORLD!  What % of Office Live users even use Workspaces?  From what I have seen, the Office Live small business community has startups and extremely small businesses with only 1 location and 1 or 2 employees.  Most of these types of businesses do not need the features you are offering in OFFICE 365.   WOULD YOU EXPLAIN WHY THESE TOTALLY SEPERATE PRODUCTS ARE BEING PACKAGED TOGETHER?    Why am I being forced to purchase if I do not use?   What I need is BETTER web design tool not SIMILIAR web design tools packaged with OFFICE 365.

You have redefined the meaning of VALUED customer.

Thanks

Wireless

Ok, I get that they want to move to "bigger and better things" but honestly I won't be using ANY of those features.  As it is right now, I don't even use the Workspace.  I went with OLSB because I just wanted a website for my small biz for the least amount of $$.  This fit my need perfectly and cost me less than $15/year for my custom domain.  As soon as they expect me to pay $6/mo plus another fee for my custom domain, they can say goodbye to yet another customer. I'm sure another company will realize what MS is doing and the hole they'll be leaving, and offer something comparable. As it is right now, I can go to Yola or numerous other sites that will fill my need for half of what MS is proposing to charge me.

Let me get this straight. Office 365 for small busines will be $6 dollars per month per user. In OLSB you were allowed 100 free e-mail accounts. We have 19 employee e-mail accounts. By saying $6 dollars per user does this mean e-mail user. In other words my bill will be $6 times 19 e-mail users per month. I know I sound like a simpleton but I need to get this straight so I can make future plans.

James Smith,

The MS folks don't seem to be responding anymore so I'll tell you what they said about your question at the introductory conference call:

First they were very vague and unsure how to answer. They implied an email account constitutes a "USER" and therefore it would be $6 a month for each. When I pressed them about multiple users accessing the account through generic email id's like "sales@" for a group of salespeople, they very cagily inferred that could be done.

I've yet to see a detailed breakdown of exactly how 365 will work. Be nice if they'd answer a few of the quetions they REQUESTED we ask here.

weBBrewers & James Smith,

    I don't know anything concrete myself yet, but in the pricing details for the enterprise version it does say that there is an e-mail only solution for $2 per month per e-mail, but I think that the enterprise itself has some extra costs and features, but those escape me at the moment.  I wish they would make it easier or should I say possible to find the answers to what are obviously common questions, but even after wading through every post, comment, question and answer at the 365 blog and every article at their official website as well all the downloadable pricing details, I still know little more than I did to start with.

I went with OLSB because I figured Microsoft would be stable and there programs would be around for a long time, besides the fact its free, a perfect price for me new business.     I don't like the idea that OLSB will be deactivated.     My question is, I have outLook 2003.   Yes its old but works just fine.   You did not mention Office 2003 as being compatible?   Will it be or will I be forced to upgrade if I stay with Office 365?

You say the cost will be 6.00 per user.    I have one administrator so is that one user?   Or will it be the number of email addresses that determine  how many users?

It seems many of use are asking the same question. It is simple. Is an e-mail account one user or is an administrator one user? Is anyone from Microsoft monitoring this blog or forum? How 'bout you AnnieAkin are you out there?

If you scroll up until you see Microsoft Office 365 Blog as a user name, you will see that it is a link to the relevant blog.  Unfortunately, even if you read all of the info there you will see that the question is ignored there as well.  Members of the 365 team are answering questions there, but even though that question has been asked about ten times in one form or another, it seems that they refuse to answer it.  Go ahead and try for yourself over there.  Make sure you ask it in one of the more recent entries as the old ones tend to be ignored.

Thanks for the insight Annie, I had anticipated staying with Office365.  After you clarified that the $72.00 annual charge was per email address, I realized that the overall increase for my needs will be substantial.  I too am disappointed with the forced adjustment to a significantly increased expense.  I'm sure that other sites would be willing to accept Microsoft's customers and referrals.  I am not opposed to paying for value, but $60 per month is too big of an increase from the $15 per year. I am a new customer and feel very betrayed by the 1 year I of service prior to the cancellation of service.  

Hello Annie,

    When I watched the channel 9 video referenced (way) above, it implied that sharing would be sent as a request where the recipient would have to accept or reject.  Upon acceptance they would then be prompted to create a user account to view or edit the shared materials.  I was assuming that the invitation sent was an acceptance of a new paid user account.  

    I also would like to know more about the $2 e-mail accounts, how to associate them with the main account, what they are capable of, and which versions that it is compatible with.  I really am trying to like O365 but the lack of information and availability of beta slots is making it hard.  It is nice to have someone attempt to answer the questions that come up, but it is better to know where to fish for them myself.  I have read every word at the O365 blog, and the official O365 site, but I have not seen anything about the sharing capacity that you mentioned.  Is this inside information only or is there another better resource for finding the needed information?

Thanks.

I am based in the Uk and currently building an OLSB website. It has taken me four months so far with many pages and HTML banner links etc where I have had to input code etc. I am seriously worried now as I dont go live for perhaps 2 months and just as I am getting going as I understand it my painstakingly designed site will no longer function??? Do I have to redesign the entire thing again and build my website again? I will lose customers for the time it takes and Nov,Dec will be the busiest trading time. When the office 365 goes live can I just sign up and continue using my website exactly the same way. I wont have to spend time redesigning will I? I am seriously very upset about this. Some reassurance would be appreciated. I dont need the fancy extras as detailed but I will pay for it if I can keep my site exactly the same

Can anyone confirm if my website will be migrated automatically or if we will have to start again?

Marcus,

The sites remain almost exactly the same (unfortunately) so I see no reason why they wouldn't be migrated with Microsoft's usual laser like precision....

The areas of concern are elements missing from the current manifestation of the 365 editor:

Business applications modules

Custom footer etc modules:

The ability to package a solution

You can see a default live O365 site here.

[url]webbrewers.sharepoint.com/.../default.aspx[/url]

Looks familiar, eh?

this is unbelievable.......microsoft is keep saying that they are introducing this service with enhanced features.more compatability etc.BUt what if I dont need them? All I need is a simple website and email..I dont know and dont need this cloud technology,or sharepoint or office professional plus.Why we are being forced to transit to or to pay for something we dont need and why you are still advertising'Free webs'ite & hosting ..Get started for free'  in OLSb home page ,when you are not going to continue it.And on top of that  your suggestion to make plans to move if not happy is ridiculous.As we are used to of it now ,familiar with the product ,with the email ..and now being told to pay for it, without any other option for merely having a website.

Something that was not expected from an organisation like Microsoft..........very disappointed

I think it's important for everyone to remember that Office 365 is still under Beta; which means there is room for improvements before final release or in the near future.  I encourage everyone to express their opinions and ideas because many companies learn a lot from their customers during Beta. In many cases, they end up making some changes to their product based on feedback they received.  There are no guarantees, but anything is possible.

I think it's important for everyone to remember that Office 365 is still under Beta.  I encourage Office Live users to continue to express their opinions and ideas because companies learn a lot during Beta.  Many end up adopting some of these ideas and make adjustments to future product release or updates.  There are no gurantees, but anything is possible.

Veritz,

I agree.

It's hard to gauge, but the response in the O365 community is pretty underwhelming based on the paltry number of comments, and the fact that most are negative.

The lack of response by MS to questions asked there is also disturbing, but that's not unusual in a beta release.. Hopefully they are reevaluating their approach and listening to the OLSB community they've already invested so much in.

I hope the both of you are right, but according to info that I received from a 365 team member there is plans to stop registration for OLSB "probably about a month from now".

I can't even begin to tell you how disappointed I am to learn that OL is being discontinued.  For those of us who have small businesses or nonprofit  organizations, OL was the answer to creating a "free" website -- well, until MS determined that a yearly fee needed to be charged for the domain name.  Or if you happened to miss the renewal date, you dealt with Melbourne IT and paid $50 annually to keep it.  Please, after all the hours many of us (amateurs) have put into making our websites, can't there be a better way to go about this??  Your reason for the change is that businesses want extra services??  Well, let those businesses pay for additional services.  Our OL website is doing great and several organizations are now using OL too based on the success of our site.  Please MS, consider your customers and don't make this change!!  

If this change occurs, I will not use Office 365 nor will the other organizations for whom I design sites using OL.  Is there any possibility that this change might no occur?

So for those of us who would definitely abandon this ship, what is the first step?  I assume it would be to transfer the domain to GoDaddy.com and then find another free web hosting service.  Has anyone tried Yola.com?  Any other suggestions?

As I stated in a previous comment, I maintain several golf league websites (and have for years).  I've just renewed several domains through OL and have begun updating the sites for the upcoming golf season.  To find out the OL services is going to be cancelled (we can't afford $6 per month and don't need extra servcies), is maddening.  Can I get my money back at this point on the domain renewal?  I'd rather not be affiliated with OL at all after this ordeal.  Are all the domains handled through Melbourne IT?  I would I be better off beginning new websites for the leagues since the season is just around the corner?  Any advice is appreciated.  

now i have to learn all sorts of other programs along with web design...thought MS was supposed to make this easier for me!

Hi...

My biggest question I need answered asap....  Is the transition from our current website(s) going to eventually be easily and painlessly transitioned over to the new 365?  Or are we too worry and all fly over to another web designer.  I am not so concerned at the cost, but at the hardships of the transition and losing any current web features....

After a year of using OLSM for a charitable trust and a small business it is clear that low bandwidth customers are not required. Microsoft has forgotten that big businesses start small (particularly in IT). I have just completed the business transition to another platform and now for the charitable trust. I nearly made the mistake of investing more time in MS Web tools. Luckily the installation crashed my Windows 7 operating system. Goodbye forever Microsoft. Its been mostly painful.

Dear Annie Please can you answer the following questions for me? First, I am a man with a OLSM website and I am very happy with it. Now I only have one e-mail for this website. It is not a complicated affair.  

Now I really do not mind paying Microsf 6 dollars a month ( or whatever ) for the same or better service in the future. In fact I would pay 20 dollarsa month for Microsft to host my website,  and this is true.

Baically this, then, when we swap over, can my website continue the way it is, although I must pay a fee every month of say, about 12-20 dollars?  It is very cheap webhosting for what MIcrosoft will give in return.

Basically, this then, if things change, and they will, Microsoft is saying that we must begin paying for their webhosting services, which is very sensible. I think many people would feel comforted by being webhosted by Microsoft, and paying a sensible fee for their services is legitimate.

If Microsoft are saying we  can stay but must pay a webhosting fee, then I am staying.

The idea is fantastic but the cost of $6 per month may prove to be a stumbling block.  I think the price should be quoted as flat per year like $30 per year for the first year so that the user gets the experience of the new product.

Querist,

There  will be a free trial period-I think either 3 or 6 months to test things out. The public site set up is basically the same so sites should transition over easily and everyone will have time to evaluate if it works for them or not.

Mousepad,

The $6 a month is really for the additional services-not web hosting  which remains essentially free. The difference is you can't get the hosting without all the additional stuff which most OLSB users who have commented have said they won't use.  

Can someone please tell me if I transition to office 365 from office live is my website going to be ok. Will I need to redesign my website in any way or will it stay the same. I am running a business and i have been doing a hell of a lot of work on seo.

Please can someone tell me soon because I need to make plans for my income.

I wish we knew this before. We would have never hosted site on OLSB.

The service will be total fiasco for microsoft.

Why would anyone would pay for $6/user for webhosting and e-mail accounts?

Any small business would have minimum two e-mail accounts; so $12/month only loosers would pay.

Sell Microsoft stocks now, is that a message by Office365?

I hope bill gates would step in and stop this fiasco.

It was only 2 days ago that the info of the migration came to me. I only have a one person spare time business. I have been an OLSB user since its beta stage. I can imagine that O365 has appeal to many. Not te me. I am satisfied with all what the Windows Live services have to offer. I see no need to move to Exchange, Lync and Sharepoint server in the cloud; all too heavy and traditional. I would not mind adds as long as the basic service remains free. That what I appreciate and use of OLSB is my own custom domain with the Windows Live services. I would very much like to keep this for free. Also, I was very displeased in the past with the fact that no proper unload and reload tools were provided for OLSB when Msft decided to stop registration of domains for non USA customers. It took me months to recover with a lot of manual work and assistance of OLSB support which had to hack into the system to remove all sorts of hanging around stuf. I used a LiveID account within OLSB to register with all sorts of Msft services, e.g. Msft Partnership. All this was broken because it is not tied together on the email address but un the unique LiveID code.

What is the impact of O365 on the Live Admin service? If they continue then it might be an option for me to migrate to them. But I would need my OLSB LiveID accounts to be migrated in any case.

Ever since the beta stage of OLSB I have been a customer with my own custom domain. I only have a one person leisure time business. I do not need anything more than my custom domain being connected to the Windows Live Services. I have no need for Exchange, Lync, Sharepoint server in the cloud; all too heavy and traditional. Please have a service for free to have a custom domain with all the Windows Live services. I would accept adds if that would allow Msft to keep it for free.

I have always been using a LiveID account within my OLSB to subscribe to other Msft services like Msft Partnership. This is all tied together within Msft systems not on the visible email address, but using the unique code of the LiveID. At the point that OLSB decided to no longer register domains for non USA customers, I was forced to discontinue my OSLB account and start a new one. There were no proper unload and reload tools for OLSB and Windows Live services. It took me months and a lot of manual work to recover from this with help from OLSB support which had to hack into Msft systems to clear all sorts of 'hanging' things. I could never repair my broken links with other Msft services. I lost years of blogging on my Live Space. Then again the forced move to WordPress! I have not found the time to set that up properly yet. I would appreciate more consideration with your customers and more thorough migration thinking.

As mentioned in a above post, it is 6.00 per user, which is defined by an email account. That is 5 accounts for 35.00. I keep hearing about thousands of people from research, so why don't these thousands speak up? I just found out about this change from a 365 beta tester and it is not a good reccomendation.  

"However, I was extremely sad to discover that there weren't any features or improvements added to the Microsoft Office 365 public website over what OSLB already has.  What MS Office 365 is offering on their Public Websites is a stripped down version of OLSB websites." small-business.web.officelive.com/default.aspx

Obviously, if this is what the 365 is about then I would not use it.

OLSB is great as it is and I would not mind paying for services, the part that gets me is that 365 is offing us to purchase their Microsoft technology instead of selling us what our own clients want.

One user would equal $72.00 dollars a year, but since I have two information small business sites with domains that going to be $144.00 dollars a year on Microsoft part. I going to another hosting site, with free hosting. Thanks a lot Microsoft, you have proven to be a monopoly.  “A monopolist dictates the price, the quality, and the quantity of the product. In such a situation, consumer would likely end up with the short end of the stick—paying too much for too little” (Schiller). Since learning this in Macro Economics, I will be moving these sites to free hosting.

One user would equal $72.00 dollars a year, but since I have two information small business sites with domains that going to be $144.00 dollars a year. I going to another site, with free hosting. Thanks a lot Microsoft, you have proven to be a monopoly.  “A monopolist dictates the price, the quality, and the quantity of the product. In such a situation, consumer would likely end up with the short end of the stick—paying too much for too little” (Schiller). Since learning this in Macro Economics, I will be moving these sites to free hosting.

To confirm my post "paying too much for too little." Original site

small-business.web.officelive.com/default.aspx

Now, I was very lucky in that I was chosen as a beta tester for this new Microsoft Office 365 offering.   I've always been an advocate for Microsoft products and I loved what OLSB was doing for the thousands of small business owners, giving them a chance to have a presence on the web.  So when I got the email directing me to sign up as a beta tester for this upgraded new service, I right away logged on and started building my new public website.

However, I was extremely sad to discover that there weren't any features or improvements added to the Microsoft Office 365 public website over what OSLB already has.  What MS Office 365 is offering on their Public Websites is a stripped down version of OLSB websites.

The Team Workspace capabilities of this new offering has a great number of new functions and features but they removed some of the OLSB website functionality from their MSO-365 public web site offerings.

Now, I have to question Microsoft's decision in shutting down OLSB and replacing it with Microsoft Office 365.  What they should do is keep OLSB going and offered an upgrade to the Team Workspace fuction of OLSB.  I don't know what they are thinking and it is so sad to see that so many small business owners are going to lose their websites for something that is not an improvement.  

Well, it's been two weeks since the announcement of Office 365 and the response is more than we could have hoped for. Clearly, this is a solution that a lot of customers are excited about, and it's resonated across a lot of Microsoft Web properties

It has Started

Microsoft has stopped new sign-ups for Office Live Small Business Websites.

Any news on transition from Office Live to Office 365? I'm worried about needing to rebuild the site from scratch. Too much work has been put in to build the site over the years. Please provide a channel to really transition existing Office Live sites to Office 365 WITHOUT going back to zero.

Any news on transition from Office Live to Office 365? I'm worried about needing to rebuild the site from scratch. Too much work has been put in over the years to maintain the website. Please provide a hassle-free transition from Office Live to Office 365 website, i.e. WITHOUT the need to go back to zero.

The last answer from someone at Microsoft was in January. Some said there were a few months free. Today is the first I have heard of this 365. I never got an email and can't seem to see where anyone is getting answers and most seem really unhappy. Our business is just starting. We are on a less than shoestring budget and yet we are now hearing that soon it may cost us $18/month if we cut down email accounts to $60/month or more if we don't.  I didn't see where any questions about website transfer were answered and am concerned with what I have heard that includes me needing to spend to buy newer microsoft applications. Some of us "NEW" small business owners are lucky to make payroll and still feed our kids. Why didn't they tell us about this before we renewed domain instead of not at all. Pricing makes no sense and now has me confused if I can even afford to stay. If I have to go to another more affordable solution how do I transfer my site and my name as I have heard that it can take almost a year to free a name. I cannot wait that long! Is anyone ever going to answer the questions that they said to post here?

Heather Garza

Owner Garza's Goodies Chocolates & Confections

I too have only just been advised of this.  I put questions on various forums and blogs until I was eventually directed to this thread.  I have a support question in asking for an official Microsoft response on their actual intentions re termination of OLSB and whether they will provide a route to migrate to anything other than 365 - I am not expecting a reasonable response but if I get one I will post it here.

Just for the record, I would add that I am and always have been prepared to pay for web hosting/ maintenance and email with access to my own domains registered now with Melbourne.  One of my sites used Wordpress in the past and I migrated it to OLSB becuase it seemed a lot simpler. Ha!

I run these sites for free and pay for the domains as a small contribution in retirement.  These are not for profit organisations or charities:

www.microhydroassociation.co.uk

www.theleme.co.uk

www.dumriesmusicclub.co.uk

Gavin

(I have been using and advocating the use of Microsoft products since 1978 - BASIC compiler and DOS - perhaps I should have ceased doing so some time ago!)

I love OLSB and have been using it for years. I'm not concerned about changing from a free service to a paid service. My concern is that 3 or 4 years from now MS will introduce a new Super duper Office 365, and we'll go through the same crap all over again. I would gladly pay for OLSB. Leave it alone and charge me for it. I just don't want to go though needless change every few years

See questions and answers from Allen_MSFT posted 2011-Apr-04 2:58 PM on community.office365.com/.../top-10-q-amp-a-feature-edition-11.aspx and reproduced below

This looks slightly more hopeful but I wish more details would be forthcoming.

----

QUESTIONS:

I administer three websites with domains purchased through Microsoft.  I use Microsoft Office Live facilities to maintain these websites and for email.  I also use Microsoft Office 2007 on a PC but do not wish to upgrade to 365.

1 will Microsoft be withdrawing the website maintenance facilty, and if so, when?

2 if the facility is to be withdrawn what facility will Microsoft provide to enable me to transfer the pages of my websites to another web server given that Microsoft's pages are proprietary and cannot be accessed by ftp?

3 will microsoft be withdrawing support for access to the email accounts associated with the domains and, if so, how can these be kept in operation?

ANSWERS

@Gavin: Office 365 is not directly an update of Office 2007, although it does come with Office 2010. But you are not required to purchase it. As for your questions:

1) Eventually, but that date is not confirmed yet. Sometime around sring/summer 2012.

2) In the coming months we will provide transition details for Office Live websites. Make sure you have enabled emails from us in your settings and stay tuned here and ask.officelive.com/.../default.aspx for more details. You do not need to do anything in the meantime.

3) While the service will end, you will have time and details on how to migrate your email to another account. Regular Hotmail offers domain email as well, so you could just move to that service and point your domain to that account.

I want to cry...........so much volunteer time into running three non-profit sites and now it looks like I get to restart somewhere else. If I was "rich" then I would pay...

I use the OLSB primarily to support non profits and provide my services for no fee. This  is an excellent tool to help small business and non profits have a web presence. Stream back on the services and charge a very samll annual fee.

I just found out about the change and am TOTALLY confused. And I'm not sure with my older computer and older MSN software if I can even use the new Office 365. MSN has sent me NO NOTICES about this. I too agree with some of the others - leave this as is and charge a small fee. Would like to know how we find out more information that we can UNDERSTAND. I've had great luck with my web site and allot of visitors.

Due to ALL the changes with Microsoft and the OLSB platform, the LACK of customer service, and the lack of seeking the advice of ACTUAL users, we have deleted all but one account and have transferred our domains to Bravenet.com (8.95/year).  I paid $200 for 2 years on a new domain, have unlimited email accounts/domains, can upload via ftp or sftp, We have COMPLETE control over our websites and domains.  The transition of our final website/domain will occur by the end of April, 2011.  I will NEVER again use ANY Microsoft product, not even the Office suites!

I have found the OLSB package a godsend and hope they realise that so many people have the current model and wish to stay with this system.

To many people the inconvenience of changing over to the new 365 and learning all about the site and its functions can be overwhelming to say the least. I say lets have some deep thought into this changeover and vote for who wants to satay with the old version and even if we have to pay $3-5 a month its something we are familiar with and know it works well.

Has anyone had any experience of this new 365 and how it compares witrh the current site version of OLSB? It would be most interesting to hear from you all who have changed or tested it out and to hear your personal views of it.

OK, I've just spent virtually the whole afternoon on this - not attending to business as I should have been, but reading all this!

What concerns me is that only a small number of us have properly heard and read up about this. I didn't know this was happening until a couple of weeks ago when I logged on to make some amendments to my site and saw "365" plastered all over the home page. I'm really annoyed that MS haven't taken the time to email us all properly about this, but left us to discover it. This is a pretty long thread, but I suspect it would be longer if more people knew about it!!

I run a retail website in the UK - I built the site (which is now pretty big) from scratch like all of you, learning as I went, with next to no knowledge. As I'm in the UK, I have never had access to the shopping cart which I think US users have had, so I've had to make use of an outside cart and a bit of HTMLing...

So here are my concerns/questions:

1) With the new "bells and whistles" features (which I really don't want, need or care about), will I be getting a shopping cart?

2) Will we be getting better looking websites for our money, with more freedom to design them how we want them or at the very least, with more design templates to choose from?

3) If I decide to stay, and pay my $6 a month, will the transition be done for me or am I going to have to stress and spend hour after hour correcting and sorting out a muddled or broken website? Can I have a bit of calming, soothing reassurance from MS please?

4) Will we be getting some proper support for our monthly contribution? At the moment it takes days to get a reply if you submit a question, or you take you chances and start a thread on the forum (and probably get answered by a helpful fellow site owner rather than MS) - will this improve and will we be getting some service for our money?

5) If we are paying for a service does this also mean that we will be treated as customers and not as guinea pigs, ie someone getting something for nothing so be grateful, and with the risk that the rug will be pulled and the rules changed at any time? Again, some reassurance would be nice...

6) Having done just a bit of digging about, it seems that for a similar cost I can find another hosting firm (with a shopping cart) - would I be wiser going or staying? Would I have to manually re-build my site (because someone mentioned earlier that our sites use something called .OLP which won't transport elsewhere, and that worries me)? And if that's the case, is it possible to build a new site (we'll forget about the hours and hours that will take me for now!) in the background with another host, and then basically "flick the switch" to change over?

And 7), if there anyone at MS who is going to read this and reply???

Am now off to read up about how to "Take your data with you" and "Remove a domain name" - just in case. Guess my customers will have to wait a bit longer....

@ Slummin!  AMEN BRO!  

My input...folks, don't waste time bickering...cause, when it's all said and done, there are going to do what they want to do and won't give a damn about our concerns.  My advise- start being proactive folks and make the switch to another web hoster that cares about doing the right thang!

I know I'm focused on that! Hey, I'm in that higher tier of folks that will be highly inconvenienced after so many hours, and figuring out stuff, going thru trails and error to get the job done for months...for it to end like this.  What a true (curse word that starts with an "F") bummer!  Take care good people using this site...I wish you well with your effort to ease the pain that's approaching! ~ "A freakin' shame folks just continue to get screwed ova and ova again!"  WOW!

I am wondering if the various business applications and custom lists I have created will be migrated to Office 365.  I have built much of my company's data storage for human resources, finances, and clinical record keeping on OLSB business applications, so I am wondering if these will survive the migration.

I understand Sandy M.'s frustrations but want customers to know that we do value the feedback.  If you would like an additional forum to provide your feedback, I invite you to complete a brief survey regarding Office Live Small Business and Office 365.  The survey contains 23 questions and should take 15-20 minutes to complete.  Thank you in advance for your time.

www.zoomerang.com/.../WEB22C7V9BPCST

I volunteer my computer skills to people for free and use my FREE website as a launchpad to assist those that cannot afford PC rpairs. My website is up for renewal in November and after reading these posts I have started looking for another alternative. I will be switching soon so I do not have to go through the harassment of O365 switching.

Wow!  What a pity party!

Kids, the free ride is over. Get used to it. Be thankful that you had a free webiste for two or three years.  

Was that enough time for you to grow your business to the point where you can afford to pay for a site like everyone else does?

Did you notice in the time you had your site that it was *never down*?  Did you notice that it loaded - quickly - from every computer you tried it on?

And did you notice how your business associates and friends turned a little envious green when when you told them, proudly, "my site is hosted by Microsoft!"?

And has your site, by the way, generated more than $15 in either direct sales or good will?  If so, then you've made a profit.  Want to figure in the time it took to build the site, including all the difficulties you had?  Calculate your time as worth what a totally inexperienced web programmer - which you probably are - would be paid (remember college interns work free), and you still made a profit on the site.

Personally, I bless the day I stumbled onto Office LIve.  It enabled me to give my fledgling business a web presence and to build it to the point where it's profitable.

Would I like OL to remain free? Of course.  But all good things have to end.  I made a profit on this site, and it's time to move on up the ladder to the next big thing.  

We owe Bill and the rest of the legions of Microsoft a big thank you for the leg up they gave us.  

THANKS BILL!

Fred@BrownCowStudios.com

Brown Cow,

    Glad you are happy to be lied to, but it doesn't work for me.  Microsoft said "free forever", so the promise is the big key.  

As far as some of the other stuff:

Did you ever notice that hundreds if not thousands of websites have simultaneously gone off line at the same time for as many as 5 days straight?  Not just once but multiple times.

Did you notice that having additional e-mails caused serious problems with log ins due to the dysfunction of live id's?

Did you notice that lots of accounts were accidentally deleted when Microsoft was cleaning house?

Have you ever attempted to manage your domain?

Did you notice that customer log in disappeared?

How about the store manager?

lots of stuff was conveniently omitted from the service with a mere editing of terms and conditions.  If their "always editable" terms and conditions are the only contractual guarantee that I get, then my experience tells me that it's only a matter of time until something I find useful may no longer be available or suddenly have a dramatic increase in price.  

Fred,

You yourself just posted what seems like a pretty big problem with OLSB:

"Nearly all the links on home.officelive.com/.../Home.aspx do not work (when logged into my account).  This includes the "design site" and "view site" links. "

ask.officelive.com/.../52141.aspx

So let's not kid ourselves about the quality of OLSB! Most of us know there are better, free web hosting/building services out there.

But like you, many people (possibly millions) have signed up for OLSB and spent time and effort building their sites based on the MS brand and the promise of "free forever".

Forgetting the utter contempt for loyal customers that MS has shown by breaking all their promises, I think many OLSB users would succumb to MS' arm twisting tactics and agree to pay a reasonable amount to avoid having to start from scratch and protect their  considerable investment.

Unfortunately they can't. Having played with Office 365 since the beta's inception in November, I can tell you with some confidence that very few OLSB users are going to be able to adapt their OLSB sites to the new service.

First, no automated transition of site content is currently offered.

Transitioning an OL domain requires cancelling it first from OL-so all email accounts will be deleted and can't be recreated for 270 days.

And of course renewal fees through the registar will then more than double.

Many of the OLSB modules have been disabled in O365 so if for instance you want to add a facebook badge-you won't be able to.

There's no option to use design software to build your site offline.

The solutions option for backing up your site-gone.

So don't believe the hype that 365 is a replacement service for OLSB. It's actually a replacement for BPOS with a neutered OLSB offering tacked onto it, presumably as a marketing concession to avoid having all OLSB users immediately go elsewhere.

I'm trying to like O365- but based on what I've seen, absolutely no thought whatsoever has gone into creating a product that would appeal to OLSB users. Take a look at problems reported in the O365 community-most of the features don't work, the service is difficult and confusing to configure and all the simplicity that was a major attraction of OLSB has been thrown out.

Forgetting all the emotional aspects of broken promises and bad faith-I question this change from an objective business point of view. Most businesses in this type of service will tell you the hardest part is getting people to sign up. MS has built a captive market of millions of users with OLSB and it's just not a smart business move to turn those people off the brand.

Then again, it's Microsoft, and their approach to business seems to be:

"if it doesn't work, abandon it and try to force people into a 'new thing'". That may be easier than trying to fix the "old thing" (IE4, IE5, IE6,IE7,IE8, IE9!), but eventually they're going to run out of customers.

So, when is the drop dead date that we should prepare for?  In other words, I will have to back-time what I need to do, re changing ownership and establishing a new website elsewhere and need to give myself enough time to do so.  I've previously been told that it's best to establish a web-site somewhere, even if it's not yet on-line so that you can have your stuff go on-line the moment that you tell the Melbourne folks (or whomever you choose) that your website should be connected to that instead of the MS site  I must say that getting the key, etc. away from MS is the part that seems the most daunting.  I worry that the moment I do so my website will be in limbo and I will never recover it.  It may just be that I will have to forget about my website name and just start over.  Lots of work ahead for many of us, I'm afraid.

You know with all the outages during the last five days including the one that happened today that lasted for 4 1/2 hours, I think that Microsoft is trying to send us a message; leave, take your domain name and go somewhere else.

Just look at this community website here, it goes in and out all day long and when you contact the support team about it (for the 5th time), they keep on giving you the same story:

My name is U……. A…….. and I have updated the Service Request # …...

I understand that you are unable to ….  We need you to Clear your cookies … Optimize your browser … Provide us a screenshot of the error….

For your convenience, our support staff is available 24 hours a day,

They send this on every request for help.

They know the problem is happening. They just hope we go away.  

Matt (the WeBBrewer), you said it so well (in your posting above, which I think should be required reading for all OLSB website owners); "if it doesn't work, abandon it and try to force people into a 'new thing'"  

I have been watching you and reading EVERY Post of yours on the Office 365 Blog.  Right now you're the only OLSB champion, trying to make things easy for us if and when we do transition to Office 365.  Sorry, I haven't been backing you up.  I just think they don't care about OLSB website owners.

I don't know why they just don't keep OLSB running and offer all that clouds and collaboration as the chargeable enhancement to the team workspace area.  They have thousandS of OLSB users that could be potential Office 365 service users.  Now, they're just turning people off with all their broken promises.

The trasition to Office365 will not be hard. The same trasition will happen for BPOS users as well. As an Office365 Beta support agent I can assure you the Office365 has everthing OLSB does plus a whole lot more including full Exchange 2010 services, Sharepoint Team Sites, a public facing site, etc;

It is very easy to trasition your current domain to Office365 and live mail migration is also available.

Think of Office365 as a major upgrade from OLSB that will enance your Small Business significantly.

Thank You.

@dlbrody,

    I am sure glad you decided to chime in and enlighten us as to how ignorant we all are.  However, unless you are using a version different than the one available to all of the beta users, then 365 does not have all of the same features as OLSB.  There are no business applications, and there are no custom modules.  This has been stated numerous times before.  Perhaps you could explain how one would go about adding google analytics, facebook buttons, wibiya bar, or any sort of javascript without having it completely jumbled by the html module.

This is a great problem to small business, with website free on the office live. Microsoft is fail in this upgrade.

OK - I get it!

The Marketing Men (let's call ours Mike) like the idea of market 'segments' (so long as they can get someone else to do the hard work of identifying them, characterising them, sizing them and valueing them) because then they can draw pictures with labels like 'Early Adopters', 'Loyal Users' and 'Worthless Freeloaders' and other such snappy epithets.

And then they can go to the Board where Mike will trot out pearls of wisdom such as 'We seem to be spending $Xm for a service used primarily by the 'Worthles Freeloaders'! Why don't we see what THEY want, and then stop offering it to them?' And sit down with a beaming smile to scattered applause having apparently saved the company $Xm. Or has he?

I suggest that our mate Mike should maybe have looked a little more closely at the profile of the 'Worthless Freeloaders'

- charities working on a shoestring who garner enormous respect from many in the commercial world; - publicly profiled individuals who reach many thousands who read their blogs for wisdom and thought leadership, who virally influence many times more than their base readership;

- creative programmers and authors working on a shoestring as their reputations work towards critical mass and positions of leadership;

- consultants who have suffered at the hands of massive corporate mis-management and are now building a regrowth of new 1,2,3-man businesses who will thrive as massive, out-of-touch corporations crumble under the weight of bureaucracy and greed and fall to rot on the commercial forest floor.

Every single one of those 'Worthless Freeloaders' who was sucked in by the (apparently) generous offer of OLSB (yes, Darlene, I was one who said: 'At last Microsoft has got it! This is one of the best things they have done in years!') is now feeling rather betrayed by Micro$oft. They are having to capitulate to bait'n'switch marketing, or, far more likely, finding alternatives for whom they will become ardent advocates. (Ask me how I know....).

Marketing Mike might have done a little better if he had recommended to the Board that they politely explain to the 'Worthless Freeloaders' - oops - OLSB user base, that they will not be adding any more features to this excellent base service, but that future developments will be made available at a reasonable subscription cost to those who feel that they need them.

He might have gone further, by explaining that the uptake of the new features would be 'free' market research - if nobody rushes to buy the latest mousetrap, maybe it won't be worth the expense incorporating it into the next release of the latest greatest version of Office?

Maybe I just made all of this up, but I have spent 30 years in the Market Research business and sat in far too many presentations which were not too different from these feverish imaginings.

Marketing Mike won't care - he will have moved on to a nice new BMW from his next victim before Micro$oft hears the creaking in the basement....

A good reputation takes a lifetime to build, but can be destroyed in a heartbeat.

First of all, I don't mind paying the $6. The cost is comparable with other hosting services and overall Office 365 provides some great services. However, my complaint is that my website was built using Microsoft Expression Web which is based on web standards and gave me many more options then the standard OLSB editor. To use Office 365 I would have to rebuild my site using Sharepoint Designer 2010 which is free but not based on web standards. They both are good products and they both are Microsoft products why can't both be an option?

Having spent lots of time trying to get OLSB to integrate with my SBS 2008 with Exchange Server and Companyweb (WSS 3.0), Office 365 makes my coordination efforts easier.  At least for me, it is easier to decide on placement and coordinate information between my domain and Office 365.  It is a solution that I can more easily implement with customers.  In addition to an in-house standalone Sharepoint 2010 Server, I had to rent and external site for customer prototyping and demo's.  Now, I can create try and buy options on my server and push them to Office 365 where I can also keep all my marketing and implementation materials.  So I am going from four places I kept information to two, and since my mind is going, that's great.

I have just found out about this 'disaster' because I could not access my web site and had come to the forum to see if there was a problem.

I don't have time for forums etc and this has come as a big shock.

I have a busy web site which is a fan site for a VERY successful singer and there is a lot of data on it, I don't want any fancy stuff just the basic web site,

If I have to transfer all my data it will take ages, so why havn't I been notified about the impending changes, why have I had to find out just by chance?

What would have happened had I not looked at the forum?

How long have I now got to make any changes, is there a cut off date?

I can't believe this can happen without Microsoft notifying  everyone by email in plenty of time to decide what they want to do.

It is totally unethical.

At the moment I can't even get on my web site becuse of some error.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Server Error in '/Misc' Application.

Runtime Error

Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons). It could, however, be viewed by browsers running on the local server machine.

Details: To enable the details of this specific error message to be viewable on remote machines, please create a <customErrors> tag within a "web.config" configuration file located in the root directory of the current web application. This <customErrors> tag should then have its "mode" attribute set to "Off".

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So now what do I do?????????????????????????

Sandra

I have just found out about this 'disaster' because I could not access my web site and had come to the forum to see if there was a problem.

I don't have time for forums etc and this has come as a big shock.

I have a busy web site which is a fan site for a VERY successful singer and there is a lot of data on it, I don't want any fancy stuff just the basic web site,

If I have to transfer all my data it will take ages, so why havn't I been notified about the impending changes, why have I had to find out just by chance?

What would have happened had I not looked at the forum?

How long have I now got to make any changes, is there a cut off date?

I can't believe this can happen without Microsoft notifying  everyone by email in plenty of time to decide what they want to do.

It is totally unethical.

At the moment I can't even get on my web site becuse of some error.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Server Error in '/Misc' Application.

Runtime Error

Description: An application error occurred on the server. The current custom error settings for this application prevent the details of the application error from being viewed remotely (for security reasons). It could, however, be viewed by browsers running on the local server machine.

Details: To enable the details of this specific error message to be viewable on remote machines, please create a <customErrors> tag within a "web.config" configuration file located in the root directory of the current web application. This <customErrors> tag should then have its "mode" attribute set to "Off".

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So now what do I do?????????????????????????

Sandra

Sandra,

I imagine they'll email OLSBers when they have something to email. At the moment, O365 is still in beta mode and there's no definitive info on how or when OLSB will transition. They have said the transition will occur over a 3 months to a year timeframe. .    

I would sign up for a 365 account, try it out and voice your concerns in the 365 community-because no one from MS is listening here.

The below post echos how I feel - I realize MS has to change things to make more money.  But If you totaly abandon your customers they will loose confidence in MS to provide a server that will not got away.  Most of us do not need the extras O365 offers.  All I want is my website and email and $6 a email address is just too much. If MS would keep the service as it is and start charging $6 to $10 a month for a webstie and 100 to 500 email addresses I would pay for that.  Please ask them to reconsider dumping OLSB. I will not move to O365 #1 because I don't want to be left wondering when you are going to dicontinue that service.  I signed up when OLSB was free even for the domain name.  When you started charging for the Domain Name I thought that was more than fair. #2 I don't need all the extra Office stuff and don't want to pay for it.

Thanks but I will be moving my 2 sites that I have somewhere else if MS does not come up with a better solution.  

tim@houndsden.com

Unfortunately, it seems that you've missed the fact that there is a very large market of small businesses who only need a web host and business email solution.  The other items in OL365 are almost certain to be overkill for all of this folks.  What certainly is clear is that Microsoft cannot be counted on to provide solid, long-term cloud-based solutions, e.g., OL Workspace was degraded to SkyDrive, Spaces was abandoned and users were sent into the waiting arms of the vastly superior WordPress.  OLSB was a very compelling platform for relatively quick and easy website development and I think a nominal cost for the service would be entirely acceptable.  For those who only need a website and email, perhaps $2 or $3 per month (comparable to the cost from plenty of other website hosts).  We understand that the OL365 platform isn't going to offer different usage options so every user will have to cough up the $6 per month for all services most of which they aren't going to use.  Thanks to OLSB, I've picked up enough website development skills to be able to shift to more solid platforms (certainly not OLSB or OL365 and OLWhateverIsNext).  In all likelihood, OL365 (or OLWhateverIsNext) will die entirely in less than five years and all current OLSB users should  start making plans to abandon the platform sooner rather than later.  Annie, perhaps you could write another post providing details on how users can (1) get their domain registration information from Melbourne IT so that they can move to another registrar; and (2) download as much of their website information as possible so that they can reconstruct their sites on another platform that will actually exist a few years from now which OL365 most certainly will not.

If it was only $6 a month that wouldn't be a problem. It is $6 a email address with just 10 email addresses that is $60 a month who with just 10 addresses can afford $60 a month and if you have 100 addresses $600 a month to use MS Office I don't think any company will find that cost effective.

Thank you for your post, Tim.  It is $6 per user per month.  Each individual user can have multiple email addresses (or aliases).  For example, Mike@contoso.com could have secondary email addresseses such as Sales@contoso.com and/or mike@contoso.onmicrosoft.com -- all going to a single inbox.  To answer some of your other questions, you may find the service comparison (ask.officelive.com/.../microsoft-office-365-and-office-live-small-business-service-comparison.aspx) and the new transition FAQs (ask.officelive.com/.../common-questions-about-microsoft-office-365-and-office-live-small-business.aspx) helpful.

All I need is a website and email.  WHY ME?  Where else should I go with the website that I have worked so hard to create?

What a nightmare decision! Many of us have chosen to use Microsoft to not only host our websites, but to be part of our livelihood. We have put blood, sweat and tears into growing our small businesses. Now we are being forced to virtually start over, with lots of unknowns. Many of us are not savvy enough to recreate what we have painstakenly built over the years.

Keep OLSB alive, and charge us a fair rate for the use of your service, then let us decide what additional services we need for our business. Don't decide for us or it will be a win/win for nobody.

I have a dozen 3rd party apps that I use and have integrated into my OLSB website. How can I know for sure that everything will still work on the new system... a detuned one at that. There is no way I will sign up for "365", Copy/Paste my website to the new system, then cross my fingers that everything will still work as it does now. Business can't be done like that, hoping and praying. This is my livelihood. This is SAD!

Please reconsider this decision to force "365" on us. Keep OLSB alive!!!

Is copy and pasting seriously the only solution available?  I read months ago that the "transition" would be smooth... I asked what would be expected of me, as a website owner/operator and never received an answer.  Now, I see that I will have to save hundreds of files, hundreds of photographs, copy and paste hundreds of pages of text and completely rebuild my websites?!  This is absolutely crazy... WHY can I not just pay you the $6.00 a month (per account) and keep my sites on Office Live?  I'll gladly take the extra storage, as I could actually use it, but the other "extras" I don't need, don't care for, will never use... and I, your customer, will have to manually rebuild what I have spent the last few years building on your system?  PLEASE - Just let me pay you to keep my websites as they are... I have 4 websites through you, and have built 2 for friends... These "directions" on how to move a website are such a huge disappointment and I do not know how I can do it within a year, at least.  I WANT TO BE YOUR CUSTOMER - BUT YOU'RE MAKING IT IMPOSSIBLE, MICROSOFT!  I was originally upset about your forced transition (and payment) in the first place but thought that if it would save me TONS of work, I'd basically have to go along with it... now what?  Are you going to let 6 websites go without any thought to a single customer who trusted, used, and recommended your service?  I sincerely hope that you decide differently... I do not expect it, but I'm still hoping.  If you ACTUALLY CARE and WANT MY PERSONAL BUSINESS I will be glad to pay you for my current service... it would be nice to have the extra storage but if I have to rebuild my websites ANYWAY why not use someone I can trust?  Because, any trust I ever had just blew out the window... And believe me when I say that I did trust you - so much so that I actually had a "Office Live" help website before all of this went down.  Is this possible to pay you for my current service or should I hand my money over to someone else?!  If ANYONE there actually reads this and cares to answer my question, please e-mail me: gotgamesky[at]yahoo.com.

OLSB was offered in the UK as one of many ways to host a free web site for small businesses and schools.

There are quite a number of schools in my area who have committed many hundreds of hours to OLSB web sites ( not really interested in other services as we have spent a fortune on Campus licenses from Microsoft ).

That time and that hard work is now being held to ransom by Microsoft in pursuit of more money. I feel I have been misled and cheated by a level of dishonesty that offers no optio but a pay up or else now we have you on the hook.

This hasn't been widely published in the UK and I am not alone in my anger at Microsoft's treatment. The inability to save the site on a local machine and easily transfer my site to an alternative offer is singularly lacking in what is being reported and in my view a quite cynical act.

Collectively in my Local Education Authority we are now discussing migration to apple and a working group is offering iWeb training and LA server hosting for free.

So long Microsoft, we leave after many years of loyal commitment to your brand and the expenditure of tens of thousands of pounds UK. That spend counts for nothing when you con users in to commitment to a well publicised FREE option and then charge once a critical mass is achieved.

Apple it is.

Microsoft WILL lose out in the long term albeit small migrations at first but this

OLSB was offered in the UK as one of many ways to host a free web site for small businesses and schools.

There are quite a number of schools in my area who have committed many hundreds of hours to OLSB web sites ( not really interested in other services as we have spent a fortune on Campus licenses from Microsoft ).

That time and that hard work is now being held to ransom by Microsoft in pursuit of more money. I feel I have been misled and cheated by a level of dishonesty that offers no optio but a pay up or else now we have you on the hook.

This hasn't been widely published in the UK and I am not alone in my anger at Microsoft's treatment. The inability to save the site on a local machine and easily transfer my site to an alternative offer is singularly lacking in what is being reported and in my view a quite cynical act.

Collectively in my Local Education Authority we are now discussing migration to apple and a working group is offering iWeb training and LA server hosting for free.

So long Microsoft, we leave after many years of loyal commitment to your brand and the expenditure of tens of thousands of pounds UK. That spend counts for nothing when you con users in to commitment to a well publicised FREE option and then charge once a critical mass is achieved.

Apple it is.

Microsoft WILL lose out in the long term albeit small migrations at first but this

I have to say, after having read all of this and been counseled by several, that I signed up for a Weebly account, after all the good reviews of how easy it was and how flexible, and I have to say that it is horrible!

It is incredibly difficult to format different sections of a page, and just when you think you've figured it out -- by separating aspects of an article into a different box -- such as title or sub-title or the article itself so that each font should appear different in the various boxes -- it doesn't work!

Sometimes it does, and sometimes, even as you're pointing to and in the box you desire, it will change the font of an entirely different box.  

Their tech support is friendly, but so far not very helpful in that they give general answers but little specific.  I realize it's free, but they push add-ons that are not free, and I'm wondering while I still have time before the changeover and haven't devoted too much time to building a new site whether anyone has any other such website programs so that I might try them out as well.

As a computer retailer who pushes MS products and services I am highly disapointed by this decision. I will be paying the 6.00 a month until I find a solution to the loss of Live mail and Hotmail features. This truley is a poor choice MS. I will have to rethink being a partner of any company that craps on it's users.

Microsoft has taken very wrong decission. I have over 1000 content pages with lot of hard work and I am ready to pay fee for hosting but it is impossilbe for me to move all my valuable content to other hosting service. All I need is hosting, other services are just of no use.  I beg kindly for solution and help for my big content site.

I need solution and big help for moving my 1000s of pages content website.  I can't believe microsoft can do this big transition. I am ready to pay for hosting but other services office 365 has to offer are of no use for people like me.  I sincerely urge microsoft to look into it before they force to move website contents. Most users will be ready to pay minimal fee for hosting. So microsoft needs to think aobut it before shutting down OL

I am ready to pay for my current hosting plan with officelive but it is not possible for me to move my site since I have spent several hours for 1000s of page websites and I have two websties which makes even more harder to move all contents. Please think about just many OL user who don't want other services but just hosting..

@balupatel,

As you can see no one from MSFT pays any attention to comments here. The 365 team are running the show so voice your concerns in their community.

community.office365.com/.../default.aspx

Thanks for your comments.  We hear your frustration, especially when it comes to transitioning your web sites.  As outlined in my original post, this is why we’ve decided to run OLSB through April 30, 2012, provide you with a detailed self-transition guide and offer you six months of Office 365 for professionals and small business and Office Professional Plus for free through a no-obligation trial.  

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When your one-time-use promotional code for this exclusive trial becomes available around February 1, 2012 we will also be streamlining the process to get your domain registry keys if you purchased a custom domain through OLSB.  Will share more details about this streamlined process at that time.  If you don’t want to wait for the promotional code, follow the six steps in the self-transition guide to move your web site, domain, email, calendar and documents.  More information on transferring your domain can be found here: ask.officelive.com/.../step-6-move-your-custom-domain.aspx.  It is important to follow all these steps in order to properly move your domain.

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We appreciate our enterprising OLSB customers who have set up businesses to build OLSB web sites on behalf of other customers.  We encourage you to sign up to become an official Microsoft partner and get listed in the Office 365 marketplace (office365.pinpoint.microsoft.com/.../GetListed) where you can offer your services to anyone building their web sites in Office 365.

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If you need assistance beyond our self-transition guide, keep an eye on the Office 365 marketplace (office365.pinpoint.microsoft.com/en-us/home) where we’re listing partners you can hire to help with your transition.  Based on your feedback, the OLSB homepage has been also been updated with the all the latest information.

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Thank you for your comments!

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Nicole

Why is it that we cannot keep our existing sites and pay for these monthly? What happens with all our backlinks we have built up to inner pages of our websites ? Will these be lost now? Also our ranking pages on google how will this be effected with the changeover? Lost of questions and not enough answers to our questions from very concerned people here. Why change something that is not broken?

Will this new 365 be able to take scripts like the existing platform does now? As my site has many and if the new 365 does not allow these then i/m off somewhere else to give them my business as there is no doubt that microsoft does not care on how many pope, they will loose through this changeover and the money they will loose. In business you have to look after your customers which is clearly not being shown here towards us website owners with this forced migration to this 365 and the work we have to put in place to redo our websites to conform to your new platform! Get real and allow people the choice here to stay with their existing officelive site or move to the new 365. There has not been enough thought placed into this action by MS if this is forced upon people.

I am genuinely gutted.  It took me ages, months to perfect ( and its far from perfect) site!!! Now I have to spend ages redoing it AND pay for the priviledge!!!!!  I feel really bad as I recommended the service to a few of my friends who were also starting out and now we have all been, quite frankly fleeced!!!!! We have no coice whatsoever, its shocking that microsoft can get away with this, millions of small business websie owners, quite literally being held to ransom by the big corporation who will now juts chew us up and spit us out!!!  I am sooo angry I could cry and am having trouble typing, months wasted and now I HAVE to do it all again! Thanks microsoft, I'll go see if I can do this somewhere else as its the principle of the thing, how dare you assume I need or want a new and improved service, I wanted to keep it simple and thats what I liked.  I really hope that you lose millions of loyal customers over this shinanigan!!!!!!!!! Its downright cruel dishonest and plain unfair!!!

so another question, not that it will get answered going by the other comments here, but how do I remove my purchased domain name, and move it elsewhere!? Bye Microsoft, sorry but I just don't need all the other crap your adding and I am not willing to break my back to move everything, be charged and then quite frankly, never use it!

Micro$oft doesn't make money on OLSB....yeah right, good one, making money is all Micro$oft cares about.

If we complain about OLSB not having features, how about adding them, rather than building something NO-ONE wants.

You seriously think that all of these posts are supporting O365.

We all want OLSB, if Micro$oft isn't making money from things; why not give us O365 for free rather than £4 a month, hmm?

I don't want a new servance, I don't want a ton of useless stuff I'd never use, I don't want a totally USELESS "pages" link....Micro$oft SQL would be about it, and I'd happily ay another £9 a year for that.

What I, and many others want, is OLSB; I guess we'll see how much Micro$oft is listening at the end of next month, until then, I'm being bullied over to O365, just because I'm familiar with how the website builter works.

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