The Situation:
Some companies are bypassing costly, hard-to-manage software in favor of
free, online alternatives that make money by showing ads.

The Background:
Consumers have been using such services for years, such as Yahoo's email
or MapQuest's maps-but conventional wisdom had it that corporate users
weren't willing to do the same.

The Bottom Line:
Large companies are still reluctant to use free, ad-supported services,
but it makes sense for many small businesses with budgets to match.

Read it HERE:
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB117496231973149939-05bQvBXmI0tpwoBlv0d98dW4r70_20080325.html

I believe you are starting to see the effects of Web 2.0 it will be more
and more obvious in the future as it grows.

Google has been working on an interface that will literally replace the
need for microsoft office as well as email services outside of google.

Open office is an open source software that does replace office and has
been around for years the corperate world tends to shy away form open
source.

However, things are changing with Java being released as open source
now.

Also, PHP has always been open source as well. Open source on the web
server marketplace in business has taken a firm stance way out ahead of
the people running Microsoft.

Currently over 70% of the web servers world wide are running Linux,
Apache, MySQL and PHP all of which are open source.

I figured I would help to stir the fire here a bit and maybe get this
posting to kick it up a notch.