In case you were wondering, Don Dodge -- who joined Google in November after being laid off as Microsoft's "engineering evangelist" -- is very happy with his new job. What's he doing differently at
Google? "The difference," he tells VentureBeat, is that "at Microsoft my group was focused entirely on startups ... Now I'm doing the same thing, but I'm also talking to small and medium businesses
and large enterprises about moving to Gmail, Google Apps, and App Engine." To a startup, what's the difference between Google and Microsoft? "The principle difference," says Dodge, "is that at
Microsoft, the software was pretty expensive," while at Google, "most tools like Google Web Toolkit and infrastructure are free, so there's not a big cost barrier." At Google, what is Dodge's greatest
challenge? "It's about getting small and medium businesses, companies using traditional enterprise software, moving to Gmail and Google Apps and the App Engine ... That's the hill to climb, but having
the background at Microsoft really helps."
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