[rgr6105]

I agree! That statement is common among the most greedy people, that any money that can be made, but isn't being made by them, is actually money they are LOSING. Maybe they should try pricing the software more reasonably. Would anyone bother cracking a $6.99 program?

[DrSpanky]

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I agree! That statement is common among the most greedy people, that any money that can be made, but isn't being made by them, is actually money they are LOSING. Maybe they should try pricing the software more reasonably. Would anyone bother cracking a $6.99 program?

The short answer is yes. I read an article some time ago about 99 cents apps being cracked and stolen from Apple's App Store.

[earthbru]

In the nineties, if you had a license to use any Microsoft product at work, you were automatically entitled to use it on a home computer for no additional fee. Microsoft wanted their software to be everyone's standard and knew that it was smarter to concentrate on the revenue they were making rather than on what they might be losing. The new management seems to have a different attitude. Perhaps another company's software will become the new standard.

[mymail]

Not to worry, I have Office Professional XP, 2003, 2007, 2010, etc.discs at home that I can install in any of my PCs and notebook at any time. So, why should I be bothered paying again for Office 2013. Microsoft is already too rich they do not need anyone buying their slightly tweaked software every year or every other year. We should all stick with our existing software instead of indulging in the never-ending cycle of upgrades. Can you imagine buying a brand new car and then having to change tires, brakes, head lights, tail ights, battery, charging alternator, radiator, seats, engine, etc. every year or every other year to "upgrade" to the latest versions even if the existing stuffs are all working perfectly well? Such stupid behavor only plays into the ulterior motive of software publishes whose sole objective is to enrich themselves at the expense of their users and customers.

[mymail]

Not to worry, I have Office Professional XP, 2003, 2007, 2010, etc.discs at home that I can install in any of my PCs and notebook at any time. So, why should I be bothered paying again for Office 2013. Microsoft is already too rich they do not need anyone buying their slightly tweaked software every year or every other year. We should all stick with our existing software instead of indulging in the never-ending cycle of upgrades. Can you imagine buying a brand new car and then having to change tires, brakes, head lights, tail ights, battery, charging alternator, radiator, seats, engine, etc. every year or every other year to "upgrade" to the latest versions even if the existing stuffs are all working perfectly well? Such stupid behavor only plays into the ulterior motive of software publishes whose sole objective is to enrich themselves at the expense of their users and customers.

[brainout]

earthbru, on 20 February 2013 - 06:08 PM, said:

In the nineties, if you had a license to use any Microsoft product at work, you were automatically entitled to use it on a home computer for no additional fee. Microsoft wanted their software to be everyone's standard and knew that it was smarter to concentrate on the revenue they were making rather than on what they might be losing. The new management seems to have a different attitude. Perhaps another company's software will become the new standard.

Yeah, but that license says that you can't be using both at the same time. You can even install the one copy on a network, so long as the software is ONLY used on ONE computer at any given moment. I don't fault MS for that.

But I'm damned if I'll buy its software now, at any price, because it is so lame and unfriendly, with glare screens you cannot reconfigure well. Older versions allowed you to change ANYTHING, including what each menu dropdown showed, the names and gif icons, etc. You could design EVERYTHING the way you wanted it. That made it productive. Lots of add-ins made up for what Office 2003 and prior lacked, so you got what you needed, back then. Had MS gone back to that standard and then wanted an annual subscription fee from me, I'd gladly pay it.

As it stands, both 2013 and 365 are FAR WORSE for business usage than 2003 and prior, so no one upgrades, except under duress. Cloud storage can be had by anyone, don't need it integrated into Office. Cloud storage is an accident waiting to happen, anyway. So too, software that auto-updates. You need freedom to interact with it, in case there are glitches, so you know what to roll back. All that is gone, from MS now. So I'm gone from MS, now.

[slamdunk]

Bottom line?

MS is a corporation and is entitled to make products and sell them for whatever price they want and make whatever money they can. There is nothing wrong with that. Go for it.

As a consumer I need to be smart enough to realize that what they are selling is entirely unnecessary (for the vast majority of users) as compared to my previous versions of Office.

99% of people don't need a fraction of what changed or was updated. Most of the time it is little more than appearance.

People just need to get a clue and stop wasting your money on these products when you don't really need them. If that happened then these companies would adjust what they do to more closely match people's purchasing behavior.

As long as there are people/consumers lined up to buy the newest latest greatest they will keep selling it and adjusting how they sell it to extract more and more money.

Stop blaming the companies for charging too much etc. Consumers are the ones with the money to decide what they buy. Even businesses...when their employees don't use a fraction of the features.

What happened to buyer beware? Maybe it needs to be updated to "Buyer get a freakin' clue"! in order to get peoples attention.

[RaulYbarra]

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Here's the clincher, though. The draconian EULA is supposed to combat piracy and bring back at least most of that 1/3 lost revenue? But how so? The people who pirated their software ARE NOT IN ANY WAY going to go legit. They're going to keep downloading cracked copies of the software, and I promise you, just as long as humanity is around, software will always be pirated regardless of that DRM or any security scheme they come up with. All they're doing with this scheme is alienating the people who actually BUY their software. But for those 1/3 in their statistics? They couldn't care less. Just gives them all the more justification to download those cracked copies. This is what I was thinking. They screw legit customers over to combat piracy, yet this isn't going to affect piracy in any way.

I've got to disagree here. It is certainly going to have an effect on piracy. It will INCREASE.

[Moochman]

Like the other commenter, I bought Office 2010 so that I could get the free upgrade to 2013. I also had a nightmare of an experience with the website validation -- didn't work -- and the customer service -- the most clueless woman ever attempting for an entire hour to fix my problem by telling me "look at the activation link in the e-mail" even though there was no e-mail and I had already followed the link she was talking about before I ever called. Luckily I *finally* managed to convince her to transfer me to another department, which thankfully was able to grant me the upgrade to 2013! But it cost me 2 hours, much of which was spent with a completely clueless "customer service" (yeah right) rep on the other end, and/or with absolute silence and hoping that something was still going on, because she was so clueless and constantly needed to ask colleagues....