That title is a pretty bold statement.
I could write a long post about how document sharing, collaborative editing, integration with Google Gadgets, etc are all game changing features. The thing is, that post would take too long to write and I don’t have that time right now. Luckily I can back up my claim with a simple formula that is available in Google Spreadsheets and next to impossible in Microsoft Excel:
=GoogleFinance("RTL","close","4/25/08")
Did you get that? Do you see what is going on there?
Google is pulling historical information from the finance markets for the ticker symbol that you specify. That example will pull Friday’s closing value for RTL (the retail market index). That specific example is significant to me because it will allow me to track the sales trends of our retail stores against the market average. That is huge.
I am sure there are some uses for using non-index ticker symbols too, but for me the ability to measure against index funds is a killer feature. I think it is such a killer feature (coupled with the stuff I mentioned earlier and remote scriptability) that I am less likely to upgrade to Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac. The only reason I will upgrade is to maintain ubiquitous compatibility with the masses.
Oh, and did I mention that they are working on offline access to Google Spreadsheets?
