Microsoft announced today that it plans to shut down the company’s Docs.com Office document sharing service on December 15, 2017.
Docs.com started out as a cooperation between Microsoft and Facebook in April 2010. Created using Microsoft’s Office Web Apps platform, it allowed Facebook users to create, edit, and share Microsoft Office documents.
The editors integrated with Office on Mac and PC devices, and allowed for local editing of documents — opposed to online editing — and syncing of edited documents with the online storage.
Microsoft relaunched Docs.com back in 2015. The relaunch added support for more supports, support for fetching documents from OneDrive, and basic commenting support.
Docs.com shut down
Microsoft is retiring the Docs.com service on Friday, December 15, 2017 and we are hereby advising all users to move their existing Docs.com content to other file storage and sharing platforms as soon as possible, as Docs.com will no longer be available after this date.
The support article provides a timeline of events to come:
- June 9, 2017 — New users are not accepted anymore. Existing users may still use the site as before.
- June 19, 2017 — Office 365 Administrators may migrate Docs.com documents and files to OneDrive for Business if a work or school account is used.
- August 1, 2017 — The publishing and editing functionality is disabled. Files can still be viewed online or downloaded.
- December 15, 2017 — Docs.com and all if its content is discontinued. Content is no longer accessible.
- May 15, 2018 — Any links pointing to Docs.com content that redirected to content on OneDrive or OneDrive for Business will stop working.-
Docs.com users may sign in between June 9 and December 14, 2017 to back up all content on Docs.com to OneDrive. The Docs.com account is set to read-only when the transfer completes, and document links are redirected automatically to OneDrive.
Docs.com users have several options when it comes to content that is stored by the service currently:
- Back up the data to the local computer system.
- Office 365 with OneDrive for Business users may back up compatible content to OneDrive for Business automatically.
- Microsoft Account and Facebook Account users may back up all compatible files to OneDrive.
Microsoft creates an Excel file that contains metadata such as descriptions, and stores this automatically on OneDrive or OneDrive for Business. About and journal pages, as well as Sway content are moved to the My Sway page automatically.
Microsoft notes that users need to make sure that there is enough free storage space available on OneDrive for the Docs.com content. Migration will be interrupted of the available storage limit is exceeded. Users need to free up space, or get more space on OneDrive, and launch the migration again on the Docs.com website.
Why is Microsoft shutting down Docs.com?
The main reason for shutting down Docs.com is that Microsoft believes that SlideShare is the better service for publishing Office documents.
Following Microsoft’s acquisition of LinkedIn, SlideShare has joined the Microsoft family, and represents the ideal platform for publishing your Word, PowerPoint, and PDF content with its audience of 70 million professionals, and vast content library.
Microsoft furthermore believes that OneDrive is the better service for custom sharing.
For custom sharing, OneDrive offers additional tools, permission settings, and security to help share and protect your data and content.
Closing Words
The discontinuation of Docs.com is the second big shut down by Microsoft in recent time (after the announcement of CodePlex shutting down). Coincidentally, both shut downs happen on December 15, 2017.
There are plenty of alternatives available, not only those operated by Microsoft, but also by other companies such as Google.
