Google docs - nice idea, messy footnotes

OK, so tried out Google docs. It's a great idea, of course, like many of the free things google offers. Although I would really resent having my important files reside on a commercial server in the US, I decided to see if it could be integrated into everyday life. So far, two problems:

• The software freezes my computer for five minutes now and then. Do not have the energy to work around that.
• Most importantly, footnotes cannot be exported properly. To me, as an academic, if the footnotes do not work, I might as well use notepad. If you export a google doc with footnotes, word interprets them as html links. If you then try to insert a new note in word, it does not see the google doc notes as proper notes and starts out at number one. There is no fix and in the google help centre I found this unanswered cry for help, dating from May:

"I created a word document and added text and footnotes. I then uploaded the word document to google docs. When I downloaded the document back to word, the footnotes had been converted to html files. Word does not recognize the footnotes. I go to insert a footnote and its starts on 1 - even though there are over 100 footnotes in the document. Help! How do I fix this without having to manually re-enter all my footnotes?"

In sum, I would not consider using GD, nor encourage my students to do so, since I would go nuts with all the technical issues. Emailing proper documents back and forth is still a preferred solution. However for simple collaborations, say a 1 page essay without notes, it still might be a good idea. Also the concept of a joint document is appealing.