Microsoft sells Office 2013 suites, which are the traditional one-time, non-subscription purchases. If you have the system to run the applications, there is no requirement to connect to some sort of active licensing server.
As long as Microsoft continues to sell standalone office suites, your handwringing is pointless.
You missed his point entirely. The issue is with one retail model versus another. Subscription versus purchase. Microsoft, like Adobe before it, would like to go exclusively to a subscription model. We can accept that, but if we do, then we run into problems down the road with being able to access old files. This isn't an issue now because there are non-subscription apps that read these files. But when new file formats come out that are subscription only, then we run into a problem down the road.
The solution to that problem is to persuade companies not to go to subscription-only models. This persuasion is most effective by everyone simply not subscribing. Microsoft and Adobe aren't in the business of archive restoring. They don't care about this. If you do, then it may be in your interest not to support the subscription model.
You missed his point entirely. The issue is with one retail model versus another. Subscription versus purchase. Microsoft, like Adobe before it, would like to go exclusively to a subscription model. We can accept that, but if we do, then we run into problems down the road with being able to access old files. This isn't an issue now because there are non-subscription apps that read these files. But when new file formats come out that are subscription only, then we run into a problem down the road.
You know, I bet at least one or two people at Microsoft and Adobe reached that conclusion and discussed the matter.
You guys make it sound like only the AppleInsider genius forum commenters have thought about this.
It's not really an issue unless the situation actually comes up. I'm not losing any sleep over it. It's not a problem today.
I'm laughing because I have several PhotoCDs from the Nineties that are getting increasingly difficult to find compatible software. Yeah, I still have the original negatives & slides somewhere.
Subscription software will make it essentially impossible for archivists and librarians, in 30 years, to read the files and archives created today. Because access to the software will be gone. Possibly even the company that previously sold subscriptions to it will be gone. Does Microsoft even acknowledge today that it once made a CP/M card for the Apple ][e? They did, because I bought and still own one. But that's hardware. Suppose Deneba Systems had only sold it's monumental, game-changing graphics software CANVAS as a subscription. Many of us would be stuck: the company is gone, the new owner of the IP refuses to even offer the program for the Mac platform (where it was born). This is one reason some of us keep our PowerPC Macs and sometimes even run System 9 (an OS X upgrade was available but is very buggy). Had this been subscription software, I'd have no access to my legacy graphics files.
So, I will write as dysamoria wrote: "Nope. Still not going to pay a subscription to use software. To anyone. Ever."
Microsoft has free viewing apps for most if not all of the office formats....
The subscription model might work for small business that can write off the cost of the subscription entirely rather than depreciating the value of software.
Microsoft sells Office 2013 suites, which are the traditional one-time, non-subscription purchases. If you have the system to run the applications, there is no requirement to connect to some sort of active licensing server.
As long as Microsoft continues to sell standalone office suites, your handwringing is pointless.
No, it's pretty irrelevant to enterprise users. Corporations purchase multiple licenses for their employees. This new offering is geared to individual users as it only activates the software for one Mac and one iPad.
Your response is irrelevant; we are talking about subscription-based software, not the ordinary offline Office suites (which we'd obviously prefer to pay for).
I'm laughing because I have several PhotoCDs from the Nineties that are getting increasingly difficult to find compatible software. Yeah, I still have the original negatives & slides somewhere.
I had someone bring me a CD made in the 90s. Back then it was fashionable in the Mac OS 7 graphic design community to name your finished projects with an ƒ in front of the file name. Those files are completely useless now. Not OS X, Linux nor Windows can even read the directory off the CD and even crashed my Mac. I also remember those 3.5" optical diskettes that claimed that the data was good for 100 years. You can't even find anyone who has a drive to read it and there are no software drivers for modern OS either.
As far as subscriptions go, I feel if you are using the software professionally, then it probably costs less in the long run and it is better from the perspective that you never need to pay for an emergency upgrade when a colleague sends you a file you can't open.
M$ has at last lost me completely as a paying customer. I don't use Office anymore. Or Windows. I use (the free) Silverlight for Netflix, and that's it. What a sad testament.
Adobe lost my future business as well. Because of their subscription model, instead of upgrading Creative Suite as I would usually do, I'm instead milking my current version until it's no longer viable, and seeking alternatives in the meantime. Plenty of options are surfacing these days. I expect I'll have what I need by the time my last "non subscription" version of Photoshop/Illustrator, etc. no longer works (5 years down the road? 3 or so OSX versions later?)... I'm sure I'll manage...
Oh really? Until one fine morning, you try to run "Subscription Word" and get the message, "oops, sorry, this software has been updated and is no longer supported on Windows XP. Keep your Office Suite running smoothly... Upgrade to Windows 8 today!"
Go have a look. Is Windows XP still supported by Office 365?
If so, it won't stay that way for much longer. Mark my words. If an enterprise "subscribes" to software like Office 365, it will lose the ability to decide its own timing for upgrades to software & OS... those terms will be dictated by M$.
The subscription model makes sense for businesses but for personal users, it's offensive.
People keep chanting that "it makes sense for business" meme, but I don't see how that's true at all. How does the subscription model make better sense for companies? In my view it partially (or completely, depending) takes over control of a company's upgrade cycles. Which means you're in a very real sense taking some control of a company's budgets and expenditures.
For example: In tough times, a company may want to wait a year longer than usual to upgrade systems enterprise-wide. This model doesn't allow for controlled expenditures like that at all. It converts all those expenses/options into an ongoing fixed cost which you MUST abide or lose the software altogether. How is that better for a company? I don't see it...
A coronal mass ejection will make it essentially impossible for archivists and librarians, in 30 years, to read the files and archives created today. Because all electronic records will be toast.
Microsoft has free viewing apps for most if not all of the office formats....
Try opening a file created by MS Word version 4 with Word 2011. Nope, impossible. It just won't even view it.
THANKS FOR NOTHING, MICROSOFT.
Sure, there are ways to convert files, but I have over 5,000 documents of family data and records that we'd like to preserve. Who'd a thunk 30 years ago when we transitioned the project to the Mac that by 2015 the only way to view the documents would be by looking at the PRINTED HARDCOPY. Thankfully, we did print all those pages. Over 12,000 of them.
In retrospect, it would have been simpler, cheaper, and more durable just to stick with the bloody typewriter with which we began the project 45 years ago.
Adobe lost my future business as well. Because of their subscription model, instead of upgrading Creative Suite as I would usually do, I'm instead milking my current version until it's no longer viable, and seeking alternatives in the meantime. Plenty of options are surfacing these days. I expect I'll have what I need by the time my last "non subscription" version of Photoshop/Illustrator, etc. no longer works (5 years down the road? 3 or so OSX versions later?)... I'm sure I'll manage...
Here at work we don't relish the idea of going to subscription CS either. But, personally, Adobe lost me long ago with the persistent nagware element of acrobat/reader.
Comments
Not a big deal.
Microsoft sells Office 2013 suites, which are the traditional one-time, non-subscription purchases. If you have the system to run the applications, there is no requirement to connect to some sort of active licensing server.
As long as Microsoft continues to sell standalone office suites, your handwringing is pointless.
You missed his point entirely. The issue is with one retail model versus another. Subscription versus purchase. Microsoft, like Adobe before it, would like to go exclusively to a subscription model. We can accept that, but if we do, then we run into problems down the road with being able to access old files. This isn't an issue now because there are non-subscription apps that read these files. But when new file formats come out that are subscription only, then we run into a problem down the road.
The solution to that problem is to persuade companies not to go to subscription-only models. This persuasion is most effective by everyone simply not subscribing. Microsoft and Adobe aren't in the business of archive restoring. They don't care about this. If you do, then it may be in your interest not to support the subscription model.
The best part about this is the 30% that goes into Apple's bank.
You missed his point entirely. The issue is with one retail model versus another. Subscription versus purchase. Microsoft, like Adobe before it, would like to go exclusively to a subscription model. We can accept that, but if we do, then we run into problems down the road with being able to access old files. This isn't an issue now because there are non-subscription apps that read these files. But when new file formats come out that are subscription only, then we run into a problem down the road.
You know, I bet at least one or two people at Microsoft and Adobe reached that conclusion and discussed the matter.
You guys make it sound like only the AppleInsider genius forum commenters have thought about this.
It's not really an issue unless the situation actually comes up. I'm not losing any sleep over it. It's not a problem today.
I'm laughing because I have several PhotoCDs from the Nineties that are getting increasingly difficult to find compatible software. Yeah, I still have the original negatives & slides somewhere.
Microsoft has free viewing apps for most if not all of the office formats....
Not a big deal.
Microsoft sells Office 2013 suites, which are the traditional one-time, non-subscription purchases. If you have the system to run the applications, there is no requirement to connect to some sort of active licensing server.
As long as Microsoft continues to sell standalone office suites, your handwringing is pointless.
No, it's pretty irrelevant to enterprise users. Corporations purchase multiple licenses for their employees. This new offering is geared to individual users as it only activates the software for one Mac and one iPad.
Your response is irrelevant; we are talking about subscription-based software, not the ordinary offline Office suites (which we'd obviously prefer to pay for).
Microsoft has free viewing apps for most if not all of the office formats....
As if viewing were the only thing we do with our files...
Nope. Still not going to pay a subscription to use software. To anyone. Ever.
Totally agree, good enough to repeat... ~~Nope. Still not going to pay a subscription to use software. To anyone. Ever.
Why in the world would i piss away $84 USD a year on this when i can use Google Docs for free?
I had someone bring me a CD made in the 90s. Back then it was fashionable in the Mac OS 7 graphic design community to name your finished projects with an ƒ in front of the file name. Those files are completely useless now. Not OS X, Linux nor Windows can even read the directory off the CD and even crashed my Mac. I also remember those 3.5" optical diskettes that claimed that the data was good for 100 years. You can't even find anyone who has a drive to read it and there are no software drivers for modern OS either.
As far as subscriptions go, I feel if you are using the software professionally, then it probably costs less in the long run and it is better from the perspective that you never need to pay for an emergency upgrade when a colleague sends you a file you can't open.
I have had Office 2011 for 4 years now.. so at $70/year it would have been $280. Pretty sure I did not pay that much.
M$ has at last lost me completely as a paying customer. I don't use Office anymore. Or Windows. I use (the free) Silverlight for Netflix, and that's it. What a sad testament.
Adobe lost my future business as well. Because of their subscription model, instead of upgrading Creative Suite as I would usually do, I'm instead milking my current version until it's no longer viable, and seeking alternatives in the meantime. Plenty of options are surfacing these days. I expect I'll have what I need by the time my last "non subscription" version of Photoshop/Illustrator, etc. no longer works (5 years down the road? 3 or so OSX versions later?)... I'm sure I'll manage...
The subscription model makes sense for businesses but for personal users, it's offensive.
Excellent.
Vedy good for enterprise users.
Oh really? Until one fine morning, you try to run "Subscription Word" and get the message, "oops, sorry, this software has been updated and is no longer supported on Windows XP. Keep your Office Suite running smoothly... Upgrade to Windows 8 today!"
Go have a look. Is Windows XP still supported by Office 365?
If so, it won't stay that way for much longer. Mark my words. If an enterprise "subscribes" to software like Office 365, it will lose the ability to decide its own timing for upgrades to software & OS... those terms will be dictated by M$.
The subscription model makes sense for businesses but for personal users, it's offensive.
People keep chanting that "it makes sense for business" meme, but I don't see how that's true at all. How does the subscription model make better sense for companies? In my view it partially (or completely, depending) takes over control of a company's upgrade cycles. Which means you're in a very real sense taking some control of a company's budgets and expenditures.
For example: In tough times, a company may want to wait a year longer than usual to upgrade systems enterprise-wide. This model doesn't allow for controlled expenditures like that at all. It converts all those expenses/options into an ongoing fixed cost which you MUST abide or lose the software altogether. How is that better for a company? I don't see it...
Fixed that for you . . .
Microsoft has free viewing apps for most if not all of the office formats....
Try opening a file created by MS Word version 4 with Word 2011. Nope, impossible. It just won't even view it.
THANKS FOR NOTHING, MICROSOFT.
Sure, there are ways to convert files, but I have over 5,000 documents of family data and records that we'd like to preserve. Who'd a thunk 30 years ago when we transitioned the project to the Mac that by 2015 the only way to view the documents would be by looking at the PRINTED HARDCOPY. Thankfully, we did print all those pages. Over 12,000 of them.
In retrospect, it would have been simpler, cheaper, and more durable just to stick with the bloody typewriter with which we began the project 45 years ago.
Adobe lost my future business as well. Because of their subscription model, instead of upgrading Creative Suite as I would usually do, I'm instead milking my current version until it's no longer viable, and seeking alternatives in the meantime. Plenty of options are surfacing these days. I expect I'll have what I need by the time my last "non subscription" version of Photoshop/Illustrator, etc. no longer works (5 years down the road? 3 or so OSX versions later?)... I'm sure I'll manage...
Here at work we don't relish the idea of going to subscription CS either. But, personally, Adobe lost me long ago with the persistent nagware element of acrobat/reader.