The article is bad.

The cache comment is a 10x exageration- the map cache is limited to 2GB (for data licensing reasons) and defaults to much less than that. In addition, many programs store user specific data in the user profile directory- outlook, internet explorer, all of the users documents. In a "normal" roaming profile arrangement, this data is not downloaded locally on Windows login, it remains stored on a network drive. Only the registry is downloaded, which can be time consuming, but really doesn't have too much to do with Google Earth.

There is a performance impact of having your cache on a network drive, but it's a performance impact to Google Earth, and an increase in network traffic. If you don't have a cache (the only other realistic option)- you end up using more of your external bandwidth, which is generally more expensive than putting in a gigabit switch between you and your file server. The real question roaming profiles add a lot of network traffic. It sounds like they should have been calling Microsoft about this a while before they installed GE....

The part about not being able to get anybody on the phone is basically true- but how much did they pay for the software? Did they buy support?

On top of all of this, I agree with the guy's general (and obvious) point about it not being a good idea to use a product that was released 3 days ago Google Labs in a limited beta for your corporate financials spreadsheets. However, for him to say inertia is preventing people from moving from spreadsheets to centralized information system betrays a complete lack of understanding of the relevant issues...