Today, Marc Benioff, the ever-vocal CEO of salesforce.com made a blog post over at Fortune on the end of Microsoft. In his post he outlines Microsoft’s latest ad campaigns, the ones spouting off about Windows 7 being "my idea." He pokes fun at one in particular where Windows no longer crashing was somehow deemed a feature.

Is that how low our expectations are these days? Certainly not in general, and it is a sad state of affairs for Microsoft that crashing is one of the expected behaviors of a Windows device.

He goes on further to point out the explosive growth and success of sites like Facebook and YouTube. These consumer websites have absolutely changed people’s expectations of what a web experience should be like: engaging, easy to navigate and providing loads of value.

Here at Model Metrics those themes ring true for everything we build. We do nothing but cloud computing, which is really what Facebook and YouTube are all about. Computing in the workplace has historically lagged behind what’s available at home. That’s no longer true. With technology from salesforce.com, Google, Adobe and Apple getting things done at the office is as easy as using your favorite personal websites.

While Microsoft isn’t leaving any time soon, newer technologies are showing better promise than the failed paradigm of machines prone to crashing.

You know the cloud computing model has hit it big when the second-largest city in the United States makes the switch. Los Angeles had previously been running Novell’s Groupwise (ouch!) and one can imagine that with the economic downturn drastic cost-cutting measures had to be made. This year they made the move to use Gmail for 30,000 city employees along with Google Docs. So instead of wasting IT resources to maintain an email server, they can now deploy those resources to initiatives that provide more value for the city.

The case for cloud computing was so clear that the LA City Council voted unanimously. Microsoft sent their big guns in to try and derail the Google move, but to no avail. Cloud computing has arrived in major fashion, and it’s become quite clear that vendors must either compete in that arena or they are in trouble.

In February, Google made the news somewhat ignominiously when it’s Gmail service was unavailable for several hours, and then again in September. Our own Reid Carlberg’s response to the issue garnered much interest on sites like Reddit and Stumbleupon: “I don’t care.” 

While his subject line was obviously written for effect, his reasoning is absolutely sound:

• Outages of Gmail are extremely rare
• Their support teams often know about a problem before you do
• You don’t need to buy additional maintenance to fix the problem
• Nobody lost any data

We’re pretty sure you’ve heard these themes before from marketing departments espousing the benefits of cloud computing (guilty!), but this is a prime example of why it works so well.

Anyone who has worked in an enterprise email environment managed by Microsoft Exchange, Novell, Lotus or any of the other major players has seen their work email unavailable but at a much higher frequency than Google. The odds of getting information about those outages from your IT was like pulling teeth, because they don’t want egg on their face.

Switching our corporate email to Gmail not only saved us a large amount of money each year, it has provided rock-solid reliability and a level of support that can’t be found anywhere else. Gmail rocks, plain and simple. 

If ever there was a ringing endorsement for the cloud computing model, it’s when the two 800-lb gorillas of computing join the game. What was considered a joke to most just 10 years ago became a very serious battle for cloud supremacy when Microsoft and IBM announced their entrance.

Microsoft is well known in business circles for its Office and server applications, but hasn’t done much in cloud computing. After a few secretive years of development under the code name Red Dog, Microsoft pulled the covers off of the finished product, “Windows Azure.” 

Much of the same can be said of IBM. Big Blue has been historically known for providing mainframes, servers, and data centers for large enterprises to run their businesses on, but didn’t have much in the way of a platform as a service. That’s now changed with IBM’s large push into cloud computing.

In late 2008, Google surprised the tech community by launching their own browser. Rumors swirled about the direction of the company, since this was Google’s first significant foray into building applications that run locally. What could they do in 2009 to top that? How about an entire operating system.

Google Chrome OS is built on the idea that other operating systems were designed in an era where most computing was done offline (Microsoft, Apple, are you listening?). Everybody knows the common complaints of those systems: expensive, heavy resource hogs that get slower and slower the more they’re used. Since many (if not most) common computing situations are now performed online, having a bloated operating system doesn’t always make the most sense.

The implications are clear. Google wants you running their operating system, using their browser, and accessing their online office applications (Google Docs). In keeping with their mantra "don’t be evil," Google claims there are multiple options from competitors to keep the DoJ from getting too keen on anti-trust issues. Google has clearly learned from Microsoft’s example.

Judging by the video below – this major undertaking is well under way, and if history is any indicator it will be highly polished upon full release.