I've been around a long, long time. I remember the first time I saw QuickBooks working (in MS-DOS!)...the fact that it had a Classes (Departments) feature, printed checks, and could reconcile a checking account made it look like it might be a farm accounting panacea.

I also recall the sudden proliferation of farm accounting software products in the 1980s. Most of the "old" farm accounting products had their start then--CenterPoint, FBS, FarmWorks. Plus there were a number of startups that have long been gone--I know, because I looked at some of them, and they are no more.

Fast forward to today. QuickBooks and those others are still around. But Intuit is pushing people to QuickBooks Online by pricing QB desktop editions into oblivion. Time will tell if Intuit's crystal ball is a good one (it hasn't always been, though they've never stubbed their toe enough to kill their profitability).

So now with most accounting shifting to online products, we suddenly have a situation not much different from the 1980s. There are several software newcomers, each claiming specific benefits for farm businesses (though there's a lot of latitude in how each defines what a farmer's accounting needs are). Some are obviously small-shop startups, just as happened in the 1980s. 

And there's also suddenly a proliferation of general small business accounting products (QuickBooks Online, FreshBooks, ZoHo, etc., etc.).

Two things come to mind:  

(1) which of these products will still be around 5 or even 3 years from now? A lot of software is being produced by small-shop startups with a good idea. (I know, because I was involved with an ag computer startup...and a couple 20-something guys can keep a business running for quite a while on adrenaline alone, convinced you have a "great" idea.) But many of them will run into a wall of shortages of technical support and development resources, as they find that their "good idea" doesn't sell softare as "automagically" as they had hoped or expected. 

And with no track record, which of these startups will grow tired of the effort or make some big mistakes? How can someone start a software company with essentially no online presence, or the handicap of running on a non-standard server configuration (Fahrenheit)? And will a company like Ambrook be able to broaden the features of their product, which for now appears aimed at a particular subset of agriculture, to gain enough market share to remain viable?

The same will be true for the general small business products:  a wave of consolidation *will* happen. However, some small players won't be bought by anybody; they'll just bump along not making enough revenue to support much spending for new feature development nor marketing. Many of these may "circle the drain" for a decade before the then-40-something principals of the company weary with not achieving the success they had counted on, and decide to do something else.  In any case, choosing software provided by a "big player" (Xero, Freshbooks, or even QuickBooks Online) is no guarantee of long-term access to their software, either.

In the mean time, moving your recordkeeping from one product to another requires a lot of work--mostly a learning curve until you understand the quirks of the new product. None of us wants to "guess wrong" in choosing an accounting product that has a short life span or that simply bumps along in the doldrums, as we watch other products seemingly pass us by to become "the" application we now need.

(2) What will happen to your data if the company goes belly up or you decide to switch to the next great/appealing application? Accounting data interchange (import/export) schemes exist...but hardly any company supports them. They want to keep you as a customer after all. 

And unlike most desktop software, the most online applications require you to pay their monthly fee *every* month to continue access even to historic data. Not being able to search for a transaction in last year's records can be a real hindrance, so you might decide that paying the monthly fee for TWO products makes sense, at least during your year of transition to a different product. Or maybe you'll just settle for exporting your General Ledger at year's end before you pull the plug on the old product, with the understanding that you can never go back. (Some companies delete your data 30 or 60 days after your subscription ends...so you can't even reinstate it.)

SIDE NOTE:  Some of the startups really don't offer good data export features; that perpetually being "on the list" to add some day in the future. So you might have to settle for just printing a P&L and Balance Sheet as the final reports you get on the old product, plus maybe exporting *.CSV files of your contacts, Items, and Chart of Accounts.

Just musings, but what are your observations about the mine field involved in picking a horse in this (accounting software) race? It's significantly the same problem it always was, but with the added risk of so many startup products right now--all of which *cannot* exist together, forever.