Three reasons to love and two reasons to hate Microsoft Office 365

By Preston Gralla

The just-released beta of Microsoft Office 365 is an impressive cloud-based suite of apps particularly well suited for small and medium-sized businesses.

Office 365 is essentially a redesign and updating of a number of different Microsoft offerings that have been optimized for the cloud. Frequently, only larger companies have taken advantage of Exchange and SharePoint because of the setup, hardware, and maintenance involved. The cloud-based Office 365 lets smaller businesses use those services. Here are three reasons you'll love it --- and two reason you'll hate it. 

Exchange and Outlook in the cloud work great

Businesses will be most interested in Exchange and Outlook in the cloud, and both work well in Office 365. No need for an IT staff to wrestle with hardware or maintenance for setting up Exchange. Instead, it's all done for you. And you'll find cloud-based tools for managing Exchange such as setting group permissions, deciding who gets adminstrative rights, and so on.