'Microsoft 365 Consumer' subscriptions being formulated

[HEXUS]

Consumers may be offered a Windows 10, Office 365 and security package.

Read more.

[LSG501]

I'm just going to say it....
I will NEVER pay a subscription for the OS on my pc, and I suspect many others will feel exactly the same.

If they start getting too heavy with telemetry, in the hope of selling the subscription, then more of us will take a more active approach to blocking MS from receiving it... you only have to look at adblocking to know how things will turn out when companies overstep the boundaries we're prepared to live with.

The current subscription for office/online storage is fine, they can have that as long as they don't stop us from running old versions of office if we don't want it.

Subscriptions for 'value adds' is fine but don't go screwing about with the OS.

PSML... maybe the article should say the computerworld article needs us to sign up (for free) to 'something' to get access to read it...

[Corky34]

If i had to guess I'd say subscriptions will be dangled as a way to mitigate Microsoft's awful updates, sort of how insiders are alpha testers and normal customers are arguably beta testers currently, pay Microsoft money and you can move to a more stable channel, anyone who doesn't subscribe will be Windows guinea pigs.

[tag75]

no way I would pay for that

[simonpreston]

Should it happen I'll happily move to Linux, full time.
That and Libre Office will be fine for my day to day.

[peterb]

I don’t know why there is any surprise at this - the writing has been on the wall for years - the idea was mooted as far back as XP- but was dropped because of corporate backlash.

The less well informed consumer will just pay up or move to Apple.

Of course it does depend on what the monthly cost would be. Also interesting to figure out how that will work for stand alone workstations.

[Friesiansam]

Pay a sub for Office 365 or use Libra Office for nowt? I'll take the latter. If paying for the 3 products combined becomes the only sub option, that will finally tip me over the edge to Linux.

[watercooled]

Personally I think people are reading an awful lot into a job description!

[Wozza63]

If i had to guess I'd say subscriptions will be dangled as a way to mitigate Microsoft's awful updates, sort of how insiders are alpha testers and normal customers are arguably beta testers currently, pay Microsoft money and you can move to a more stable channel, anyone who doesn't subscribe will be Windows guinea pigs.

There's already LTSB for that. Though this could replace it.

[nobodyspecial]

If MSFT goes sub, I go P1RATE. PERIOD. I will never pay for something they can shut down. I'll simply turn it on forever with a "tool"...LOL. I'll do the same for everyone I know and so will everyone I know in IT Don't try to force me to buy something I don't want, especially when I can go around you in less than 5 seconds (the time it takes to fire up a kms solution etc). Microsoft's plan won't work on anyone I know. It is EASY to create piracy with stupid business plans. Subs at home is a stupid plan. I'll also investigate linux far more strongly than now if this is the case to eventually LEAVE windows (my goal anyway at this point over win7/10, both waste my time vs. XP's speed and ease of getting stuff done). Everything in win10 takes me more clicks than 7, and far more than XP which exposed everything and just worked easily. But then, it was only made for a DESKTOP, so of course things on xp were easy to do.

[Corky34]

There's already LTSB for that. Though this could replace it.

I thought 'technically' you had to be a business to be on that, i can't remember what it's called or what the cheapest option for that costs though.

(I put technically in single quotations as i know there's ways around that).

[spacein_vader]

There's a lot being read into this and even if it's all true I don't mind it existing as long as it's in addition to the current licencing model. Having extra options harms nobody.

If they do start restricting that though so current options are no longer available then that's a whole different ball game. I only use Win10 on my gaming machine and even that dual boots Ubuntu as well.

That said I'm a happy Office365 subscriber. My pc, daughters laptop, mother in law's laptop, parents PC and laptop all licenced for £7ish per month is fine by me, particularly with 1tb cloud storage each which is handy for the parents and in-laws for when they inevitably Bork their pc.

I only use mine as a redundant backup of my music collection though so I'm not touching the sides.

[cheesemp]

Meh - Only use Windows for gaming or remoting onto my work PC now. Also the few simple letters I write I've done fine with Google docs. I'm not buying (my office has just moved to 365 however).

[DanceswithUnix]

As a Linux user this could be handy. I can use everyday Office365 bits like email from a tab in my web browser, but sometimes you have to fire up a VM. Having the license for that Windows VM included could be handy, though on my company Dell laptop I did manage to eventually extract the Win10 key from the BIOS to use in the VM which worked.

But otherwise, I presume the bundling of Windows is to allow them to say only the latest Windows 10 version is supported. It also helps them try and rebuild the old walled garden from when Windows was king, but in these days of Android I don't think they will ever get mindshare back.

[mark_a_scott]

If the update model is anything like corporate 365 offerings, they will move to a monthly cadence which may not be the best idea ever. Problem is, Microsoft have now "lost" the revenue they would have had from upgrades to new Windows versions so they want to monetise what they have currently.

[peterb]

It does make sense for corporate organisations as purchase is a capital expenditure, where as a subscription is an operating cost ad makes the accounts look better