Do any of these scenarios sound familiar?

You saved your paper to disc or flash drive, only to find that it doesn’t open properly next time you try to work on it?

You *thought* you saved your paper to your disc, but it’s nowhere to be found?

You stayed up all night finishing your essay and all that’s left to do is print but you’ve left the disc or flash drive at home?

The new Microsoft Office 2007 interface just isn’t doing it for you?

Free online word processing sites offer an alternative to these scenarios–you just sign up for a free account and then type away. Work is saved as you go along and you can just log back into it next time you need it. Now, AS LONG AS YOU HAVE INTERNET ACCESS, there’s no more digging around for that tiny flash drive, hoping that you remembered the right disc or worrying that you won’t be able to open up your file.

Here are a few free online word processing options that you can experiment with:

Google Docs & Spreadsheets: If you’ve got a Gmail account, you already have a Google Docs account, too.

Zoho Writer: Free registration gives you access to the Zoho word processing system. Zoho also offers spreadsheet and other presentation applications.

AjaxWrite: AjaxWrite requires the Mozilla Firefox browser. In addition to word processing, they also have spreadsheet applications and even a graphic drawing tool and music player.

(note: this post is back by popular demand! It was originally posted in June 2007)