[IxDA Discuss] Microsoft to license Office 2007 UI system

[pauric]

On 12/1/06, Pabini Gabriel-Petit wrote: "Users are either served ads or pay
a fee to use an application. Their choice. However, it's still possible that
having to design layouts for the presence of ads might negatively impact the
design for paying customers, unless ads always reside on separate pages."

It would seem there's a blank canvass to work with here:
http://office.live.com/

I think someone commented on the ajax-esque look of the ribbon, and someone
else asked if it would not be better to place the ribbon to the side -
perfect for ads.

I'm left wondering if a signature on the 'licence' is the cost of entry in
to some form of app marketplace.  It would make perfect sense for MS to
apply a unified look and feel to the new 'web as a platform'.  I feel this
would certainly make working on a MS certified application more appealing
than fending for myself out in the wild, patching together various disparate
applications.  My only concern is that the new office UI suites document
manipulation and does not fit well on to PIM or communications for example.

Pabini Gabriel-Petit also wrote: "My guess is that the elaborate behaviors
they've designed for the display of the ribbon when a user resizes a window
are probably patentable, because they're so specific,"

Maybe, is it much different than this gem?
http://haveamint.com/mint-demo.mov and there must be a few other sites that
use the sciptaculus sortable command that end up looking something like the
ribbon resize