by DomenicoMazza
4 subcomments
- This change would go against multiple consumer guarantees in Australia where it's 1) a right to have undisturbed possession of a product 2) products must be fit for the advertised purpose https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/buying-products-and-servic... Microsoft would be breaking consumer law if the change goes ahead for the perpetual licenses they sold in Australia
- Been using LibreOffice for years. Everyone should. If we don't vote with our choices companies like Microsoft will keep pushing the envelope until you have to pay a monthly fee to turn on your own computer.
https://www.libreoffice.org/
- I believe the urgent deprecation timeline here may be related to ai labs using offline licensed Office in agents as part of workflows and Office integration. Microsoft wants _each_ agent instance to be a separate license[0]
There was always a probability that Microsoft were going to funnel offline users into O365 at some point - but I imagined that to take place over months / years not weeks and days.
Buying a single license for thousands of agents may have expedited that. It has resulted in non-Microsoft labs having better ai integration into their products than Microsoft.
edit: just read the detail of the note - so this is a cert expiry as part of Apple dist that is being warned about ~2 months before it happens. Standalone on Mac has a term limit.
[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-executive-suggests...
by allajfjwbwkwja
4 subcomments
- This shouldn't be legal. The software was clearly marketed as a classic fixed-in-time release, like the old CD releases, that would not be updated but would work indefinitely. Now they're going to boldly revoke the licenses???
by thunfischtoast
2 subcomments
- When the pirated version is truer to the original contract than the official version. What a time to be alive.
- If not for the fact that some commercial software addons work only in Excel I'll be using only Libreoffice for everything. In fact that's the only major thing that's stopping me from totally abandoning Windows for Linux as well.
I'm guessing that's the situation for several others though there could be other use cases that's Excel only.
Instead of pressing Microsoft, it would probably make sense to force such vendors (SAP, Oracle etc) to release their office add-ons for Libre office.
That'll kill two very profitable birds with one stone.
by h4kunamata
0 subcomment
- Okay, things were different back then but right now you only use Microsoft products if you agree to never own it.
Microsoft Office?? LibreOffice is opensource, has everything from Word to PowerPoint, it is free, and just works.
Microsoft Windows?? Linux is free, the majority of folks use their Windows PC to Watch Netlix, YouTube, social media, write a thing or two.
Distro Linux such as Mint Cinnamon is lightweight, fast, stable, I can use it to 3D design, 3D print, coding, video edition, playing, you name it, it all just works.
The main problem I see is folks following hype like CachyOS, Ubuntu (dead dsitro harvesting users data), Arch, then have bad experience and blame Linux.
You do not need Microsoft in 2026, full stop.
by letmeinhere
0 subcomment
- When I read "degrades functionality" I thought it was going to be some minor cloud-related feature, but holy shit they're disabling the ability to save files?? That article headline is really underselling it.
by jmward01
13 subcomments
- This is the new way and we need to stop it now. Forget the 'is it legal or not' arguments, their lawyers will win. Just get mad and tell them this is wrong. Stop buying their #$@#$ software. Block them. This is what is wrong with cars too. Don't want to give them real time data on you and your passengers and instead try to disconnect the modem? Well, no car functionality for you even if it doesn't need it. -get mad- Stop taking it. Microsoft is the enemy and needs to be treated that way. Same with any tech company that does the bait and switch TOS world. I buy so little software now and it is hard, but unless we stop this now it will only get worse.
by ok_computer
3 subcomments
- I’ve always bought a fresh perpetual license to office home and student with every new computer since 2005. That is four mac computers total and I assume ~$600 in office licenses over 21 years. Not a ton of money but not zero.
My resume is typeset in LaTeX and I don’t make many slide decks for personal use. I figure I can get a decent Tex template. I don’t use excel much anymore.
For my next mac I’ll probably just skip Office. I do not want a software subscription.
I also usually buy Sublime text + Merge and Cubase audio, USB overdrive, Graphana for svgs, maybe a few other licenses. I will buy and do not pirate software, devs and companies deserve compensation for their work. I also do not rent software. Though I do a small yearly donation ($50) to the Python software foundation because that language got me out of hands-on labor in labs.
I don’t care about agents at home. If Microsoft abandons a staple software package that has been a standard in personal computing since the 90’s then I’m only their customer at work lol.
- How quickly certs went from "securing your software" to "securing our business model".
- The best company to do Microsoft in is Microsoft.
They are responsible for awesome sales of MacBook Neo.
- MS hates him! Find out this one trick they don't want you to know!
$ sudo pacman -S libreoffice
- Did Apple pay them to drop support to boost their revamped Numbers/Pages/Keynote suite (ClarisWorks Infitniy.0).
Obviously this is a joke, though there was a period when Microsoft invested in Apple to serve as a stand-in foil for the anti-trust lawsuit. So tactical investing for something other than monetary ROI has precedent …
- Time to get cracking I guess...
https://massgrave.dev/
by BetterThanSober
0 subcomment
- I don't like the fact that a company can literally steal purchased product back from its users but I don't see how any company can realistically support a product for a long period of time, especially if it is a B2C perpetual license product
If Office 2019 got a zero day RCE just by opening a Word documents, the optics would be tremendously bad for Microsoft and they had to patch it, which cost money and time. We're on a day where zero day can be found using AI, and it's getting better at it every iterations. No, saying that it is EOL and "yeah not my problem" wouldn't fly at their scale, just see XP and how long they have to extend the support period
I'm not saying "but think of the multi-billion dollar company", I'm sure they can support it indefinitely, I'm just not sure if doing that is a good use of engineer's time
- Ironically my pirated copy of Office Mac will work perpetually. Arrr for the win.
by bastawhiz
4 subcomments
- Interesting that the deadline is checks notes one day before the Nightmare deadline. Definitely not a coincidence, right?
by themadturk
0 subcomment
- The last time I refreshed my Mac setup I didn't reinstall my standalone Microsoft Office, which I'd kept for the (very) occasional Word compatibility need.
Looks like I can trash the installer now, save a little drive space.
by tobadzistsini
0 subcomment
- Fine, I'll continue with LibreOffice if Satya insists.
by notamario
1 subcomments
- Yarr, this be thievery.
- When did "hate the customer" become a thing?
- They have the nerve to degrade and call it now a view-only?!!! This is the reason why pirtacy is justified; it was a perpetual license. I hope Europe is watching and governments walk away
by ronbenton
2 subcomments
- I’m shocked I say. Shocked.
by 866-RON-0-FEZ
0 subcomment
- I am impacted by this and am furious about it. Mostly because I'm reading about it here and not from, you know, Microsoft, of whom I am a customer.
If Apple can release updates for ancient iOS versions to update certificates years after the fact, then these fucking assholes can do the same. The auto-update functionality is there. They are choosing not to use it.
- I genuinely don't understand why anyone would ever make a business transaction with Microsoft.
Like, they're up there with crypto companies in the category of "This outcome was so inevitable that if you didn't expect it, maybe you should consider finding a legal guardian"
- I haven't read California's "Stop Killing Games" bill but I wonder how close this comes up against it or similar laws?
by telotortium
0 subcomment
- If you only need to keep Office around to occasionally edit a file while preserving formatting, there’s now another option in 2026 - get a coding agent to do it for you. I’ve had Codex make substantial edits to financial model spreadsheets a few times, and it knows enough about how to modify office XML files to do that work correctly. Occasionally Excel didn’t like some of the files at first, but the view-only version of Office for Mac works well enough to allow Codex to discover and fix any incompatibility. Between agents and LibreOffice, no need for Office anymore.
- After Stop Killing Games [0] has been doing some big steps forward lately, plus movement in the same vein has been showing up in California, we now need to start working on a more general Stop Killing Software act.
[0]: https://www.stopkillinggames.com/
by flenserboy
0 subcomment
- It's clear they don't want stand-alone Office anymore. One gets the feeling, given how Windows has devolved, that they'd like to rid themselves of all desktop software so they can focus on the backroom, perhaps because the data they could acquire is tastier.
- Don't forget, this is the same company that is killing Publisher with no true alternative to open existing .pub files. At least they aren't planning to rip Publisher away from perpetually-licensed users (yet).
by skeledrew
1 subcomments
- Well, technically they never said the products would continue to function with the same functionality. But also this is Micro$oft, and I would've thought people would know by now that do only what's in their own interest.
- I have a purchased copy of Office 2013 and they can pry it off my cold dead hands.
by laserlight
0 subcomment
- Louis Rossmann's video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRnno9VIZx0
by inventor7777
0 subcomment
- I am so glad that I am not forced to use Office. I know for some that they can't escape, but I would hope your workplace would cover it if so.
I personally get by just fine with the built in converter tools in Apple Pages and Keynote, they seem just as robust as the Microsoft counterpoints. To be fair, I don't have those super complex and advanced word processing needs.
- This could be class action worthy..
- s/perpetual/permanent
perpetual has pejorative connotations and only started appearing in marketing speak when software rental became the new business model.
- There is a reason why EU is leaving Microsoft ecosystem...
by DavidPiper
0 subcomment
- Everyone got real loud when Windows 10 was killed off. And it happened anyway. I expect the same will happen this time, as do Microsoft.
Might be time to go back to a second, air-gapped machine so I can actually use all the software I paid for.
- I also don’t love how if you have a microsoft account, it will immediatley convert your perpetually licensed products into office 365 products and force you to reinstall.
- What's with these companies? Netflix and Amazon Prime shoving ads despite charging people. Everywhere you see there's the greed to extract more and more.
- Sound like Microsoft's given me permission to make some binary patches to return functionality I already paid for, and to share it with my 7 billion closest friends. Cool.
by BobbyTables2
1 subcomments
- I don’t understand why anyone would continue to use an EOL version of Office.
Only makes sense on an airgapped system that will never exchange files with the outside world.
by userbinator
0 subcomment
- Microsoft 365 apps use a digital certificate to validate licensing. The certificate currently in use expires on July 13, 2026.
...and I'd almost be willing to bet that, as usual, the cracked version will remain perfectly functional.
by timnetworks
0 subcomment
- This is why TXT and MD and RTF exist.
This is why CSV exists.
This is (some of) why some governments are moving away from this junk.
But microsoft's incompetence keeps a lot of people employed.
by adithyassekhar
0 subcomment
- I should’ve pirated instead of buying Office 2021..
- This should be treated as an organised crime syndicate stealing the purchase price from every customer.
- Meanwhile 2016 is still working fine…. Until Rosetta support is dropped.
- Anyone who has paid any $ to MS in the last 25 years will get exactly what they deserve.
- Just a few days before the release of EuroOffice, what a timing.
by ____tom____
2 subcomments
- So, do I just disable updates?
How do I do that?
- More users for LibreOffice.
- wow ... this has got to be illegal, right, right ??
- class action lawsuit?
maybe i'll eventually get a settlement for my multiple Office Mac licenses that won't buy me a latte. what a joke.
note to self: never buy anything from MSFT ever again.
- Just use LibreOffice or other better tools like TeX instead of a WYSIWYG editor. With AI it is easier than ever to port existing documents, even if you have to OCR the original.
- If digital purchases are not ownership then piracy isn't stealing.
by matheusmoreira
0 subcomment
- > By May 30, 2026, the original 2023 end-of-support page had been re-dated and rewritten on Microsoft's site; the "continue to function" clause was removed.
Never fails to impress how utterly Orwellian these big techs can be.
by dreamcompiler
0 subcomment
- They do this to Office 2021 routinely if your computer is offline more than about 30 days at a time. I run LittleSnitch to keep Microsoft blocked; my copy of Excel periodically goes into "read-only" mode. So I unblock Microsoft, let Excel talk to the license server, and then block Microsoft again.
Now Microsoft says my Excel will never work again. I'm pissed. Time for an FTC complaint.
- I would encourage affected customers to go to small claims court. You’ll probably get a default judgment. Small claims court was created for just this type of issue.
by yoyohello13
1 subcomments
- If you’re still using Microsoft products at this point it’s your own damn fault. They have been doing this shit for years… decades.
- I guess that means they are fine with users ignoring their rights too? Just crack their software until something better comes along?
by classified
0 subcomment
- You can always trust Microslop to screw you over despite any past promises to the contrary.
- Companies might need Microsoft, but why are people panicking who could replace ms office with other office suites? Why aren’t they abandoning Microsoft products? From office suites to windows?
by nacozarina
1 subcomments
- the faux outrage is maddening; you knew they were snakes when you bought the product and you bought it anyway
by SanjayMehta
0 subcomment
- Explains why sites like stackcommerce have been selling discounted keys for Office.
- There are many open source alternatives/upgrades to M$$$ products.
No reason to keep using them. Literally none.
I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004. Some times I needed to use MSOffice for a paper. It was always problematic.
I haven't use VS since 2007. I migrated to gcc. Never had a problem.
SQLServer? Only for demo and at work just to pull or save data. Postgres always saved the day. Windows Media Player? MPClassic or VLC worked fine.
There maybe other alternatives I use without knowing. Always without problems.
- another tick in the "never ever have a partnership with Microsoft" column...
- Another situation in which the fragility of CA TLS creates finite and very short software lifetimes. No software that uses CA TLS can say their applications "will continue to function". But Microsoft did and that's on them.
by tokenfaucet
0 subcomment
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- [flagged]
by hbwang2076
0 subcomment
- [flagged]
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by startpage_com
0 subcomment
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by selectively
0 subcomment
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by yulia_dev_la
0 subcomment
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by Henchman21
0 subcomment
- Remember when we used to revoke corporate charters for anti-social behavior?
/s
by sieabahlpark
0 subcomment
- [dead]
by systemBuilder
2 subcomments
- [flagged]
- I’m trying to build SmallDocs, a new markdown first browser based document format (mainly for ease of use by agents): https://sdocs.dev
More info on a ShowHN here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47777633
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