Google Docs, Slowly Morphing into Google Drive
The new interface of Google Docs, which is slowly rolled out to all users, brings the service one step closer to an online storage service. The “items by type” menu replaced “PDFs” with “Files”, suggesting that Google Docs will allow users to upload any type of files.
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the third act in Google's quiet rebuild of Docs: a redesign landed back in February 2008, and just last week TechCrunch flagged that another Docs redesign was on its way. What the rollout reveals is the direction of travel — the "items by type" menu now lists "Files" where it used to list "PDFs", a small label change that reads as groundwork for accepting any file type, not just Google-authored documents.
First-order effects
- Users receiving the slowly rolled-out interface get a document list organized around generic files rather than Google-native formats, changing Docs' mental model from 'word processor' to 'place where my stuff lives'.
- Google itself gains a staging ground: the UI change lets the company test storage-oriented navigation before committing to any-file uploads.
Second-order effects
- If arbitrary uploads arrive, Docs starts competing with dedicated online-storage services rather than only with office suites, since users could park backups alongside their documents at no extra product switch.
- The change pressures Google to solve the follow-on problems of a real storage service — quota economics and sync — which a document editor never had to confront.
Third-order effects
- The pattern points toward office suites absorbing file repositories outright, collapsing the boundary between creating documents and storing everything else — the trajectory the Google Drive entity represents.
- Storage would shift from a standalone product category into a feature bundled inside free productivity tools, squeezing services whose only offer is a folder.
The trend: Productivity suites are evolving into general-purpose cloud storage platforms, with interface changes like this one marking each step of the absorption.