14 DAY TRIAL // Google is now enabling all Apps users to access many of the company's existing products aimed at regular users. This means that people with a Google Apps account from their school or workplace will get access to services such as Picasa, YouTube, Blogger or AdWords, providing their administrators approve.
Google announced this move earlier this year and it is now finally available for everyone. Domain administrators will be able to activate any and all of the new services available for all users or on a case-by-case basis.
"Starting today, customers worldwide can access a full spectrum of services from Google—including more than 60 productivity-boosting applications that extend far beyond any traditional software suite," Derek Parham, Lead Software Engineer for Google Apps, wrote.
"Coupled with the ability for administrators to provide different sets of applications to different groups of users, the possibilities for empowering workers in new ways are remarkable," he said.
"For example, you could equip your marketing team with Picasa Web Albums so they can collect and share photos from customer appreciation events, and let that team publish your company’s blog with Blogger," he explained.
There are over 60 Google services and apps than can be activated for Apps users. Apart from the obvious ones, Picasa, Blogger, Maps, users can access even some of the most obscure services like Google Moderator, Chrome Sync or Fusion Tables.
All Apps users will be able to transition to the new infrastructure, that supports the regular Google apps, over the next two months. New users will get the new infrastructure right away.
Google makes it clear, with several warnings and notifications, that these generic services are not covered by the regular Google Apps license or support.
Along with the move Google has simplified, or at least changed, the naming scheme for the various versions. The free Google Apps Standard Edition is now simply Google Apps. Premier Edition becomes Google Apps for Business, Government Edition becomes Google Apps for Governments and so on.