Microsoft Will Cut Services to Standalone Office Users so They’ll Subscribe to Office 365

OneDrive and Skype are both banned at my work, so that's a no go.

I also uninstalled OneDrive off my Win 10, I don't want the opportunity to accidentally something to a cloud which I have not taken measures to secure, mainly because I never use it, I always store my data locally, and carry the storage device if I need to move it. I don't trust cloud storage security at all.

Also, I am pretty sure my work will NOT be adopting 365, they want to keep everything as in house as humanly possible.
 
chenw said:
OneDrive and Skype are both banned at my work, so that's a no go.

I also uninstalled OneDrive off my Win 10, I don't want the opportunity to accidentally something to a cloud which I have not taken measures to secure, mainly because I never use it, I always store my data locally, and carry the storage device if I need to move it. I don't trust cloud storage security at all.

Also, I am pretty sure my work will NOT be adopting 365, they want to keep everything as in house as humanly possible.
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Skype and skype for business is completely different.
I betchya skype for business is allowed, not that it's any good - just Lync with a new more recognized name.
 
It isn't. Our workstations have no direct access to the net, I must use a VMware View Client to do so.

Basically, apart from the marketting department, our workstations are air-gapped.

I picked out OneDrive and Skype specifically because Cloud Storage and communications programs are explicitly disallowed under all circumstances.
 
GotNoRice said:
99% of everyone I know who uses office just uses it for Word and Excel, occasionally PowerPoint also. Some use Outlook but only with their own email servers.

OneDrive and Skype seem like two things that Microsoft are constantly pushing people to use, whether they want to or not, so the idea of them restricting access to those is nothing short of a sad joke.

I'd even go back to using Office 2003 before I ever switched to Office 365.
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Bring back Windows Live Messenger. Was great for long text only conversations. Steam Friends List just doesn't compare.
 
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Flogger23m said:
Bring back Windows Live Messenger.
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Blasphemy! You can't be a software dev in the 21st century and keep alive efficient, functioning, and well layed out, none bloated software! They all MUST be made into terrible applications that have an ever limiting UI and functionality list regardless of how many buzzword bullet points teh "new" versions WhatsNew list can handle! (thats provided they even give you a list of whats new anymore.. which a lot are now {not} doing).
 
Case 1: Microsoft never changes anything, and we can all party like it's 1999! Then Microsoft is behind the times, needs to update, evolve, change their business model to survive

Case 2: Microsoft updates, evolves, changes their business model to survive in the modern computer era, and they are the vile evil of the world taking away our toys

Either way, I don't see how Microsoft can win. They might as well close up shop now and quit trying, since the Penguin overlords are an unstoppable force that will soon liberate (take over) the world!


Now, more seriously - a business decision that affects business users, just being used as an excuse by MS haters to hate more.
 
Some good news from Microsoft, finally. I hope this also means I'll stop being nagged about OneDrive every time I open an Office application.
 
Before overreacting, look at what they are saying. When support ends for these products, they are removing them from using online features. I don't think you can fault Microsoft for blocking old software for contacting their modern services.
 
bigdogchris said:
Before overreacting, look at what they are saying. When support ends for these products, they are removing them from using online features. I don't think you can fault Microsoft for blocking old software for contacting their modern services.
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Of course not. I hope they ban Win7 from accessing the Internet while they're at it.
 
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jardows said:
Case 1: Microsoft never changes anything, and we can all party like it's 1999! Then Microsoft is behind the times, needs to update, evolve, change their business model to survive

Case 2: Microsoft updates, evolves, changes their business model to survive in the modern computer era, and they are the vile evil of the world taking away our toys

Either way, I don't see how Microsoft can win. They might as well close up shop now and quit trying, since the Penguin overlords are an unstoppable force that will soon liberate (take over) the world!
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Case 3: They provide worthwile and logical updates and changes while not shitting up previous iterations.
 
As a small business owner i really only use excel and word and do not have the need to colaborate with a large group or home base. Yes I do have office 2007 installed but have been suing open office or google doc just fine.
Google docs while not the best on the planet works just fine for the small scale I work in and can access it on the road to pull up docs to share with clients if need be. The more MS pushes the more I flee.
 
Megalith said:
Standalone versions of Office are getting neutered a wee bit to make the subscription version more appealing: after Oct. 13, 2020, OneDrive and Skype for business will only continue to function for the latter. I don’t think these enterprise versions are relied on all that much, but this could be the start of more and more features being taken away from the perpetual versions of Office. Microsoft’s reasoning is security and feature compatibility.

…consumers who have already purchased “perpetual”—i.e., standalone—versions of Office, such as Office 2010, Office 2013, and Office 2016, would be cut off from accessing the business versions of OneDrive and Skype after mainstream support expires. Those who have purchases those Office suites will be allowed to connect until Oct. 13, 2020—the day mainstream support ends for Office 2016, and the day the new support policy kicks in.
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Possibly because Office 365 subscriptions are starting to fall off.

Microsoft: If we can't get them to perpetually pay, we'll cattle an@l prod them.

There's a lot of businesses that use Skype for business (Lync). If this is the case, they might switch to other apps. Lotus has an office messenger last I checked.
 
Armenius said:
Some good news from Microsoft, finally. I hope this also means I'll stop being nagged about OneDrive every time I open an Office application.
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No, now you'll just be nagged to upgrade to O365. ;)

To be honest, I didn't realize that retail copies of Office came with OneDrive and Skype for Business in the first place.
 
Meeho said:
Case 3: They provide worthwile and logical updates and changes while not shitting up previous iterations.
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And who is the judge of whether that is a good update or not? Let's be real here - no one is trying to "catch up to" or emulate Libre/Open Office, Google Docs, Word Perfect, etc. All those programs are trying to emulate MS Office. Office suites have had "good enough" features for at least 20 + years, so one could argue that inclusion of One Drive and Skype for Business was not a worthwhile and logical addition to MS Office, and it is a good thing that they are taking it out. Besides, OneDrive and Skype for Business are services anyway, so it makes sense to bundle them with a subscription package, rather than a stand-alone package.
 
DigitalGriffin said:
Possibly because Office 365 subscriptions are starting to fall off.

Microsoft: If we can't get them to perpetually pay, we'll cattle an@l prod them.

There's a lot of businesses that use Skype for business (Lync). If this is the case, they might switch to other apps. Lotus has an office messenger last I checked.
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LOTUS.... I last used their crap about 7 years ago.

Unless it has changed significantly.. as in a complete rewrite from the ground up, it is most likely still complete crap.
 
They've already been doing this for at least the past year. There are new features and support being rolled out to Office 365 Users not rolled out to standalone users.

For instance, some kinda of power map addin for excel was recently provided to 2016 365 users. Then in September Microsoft announced a re-introduction of DBase support for Access 2016 365. None of that has been made available via updates to normal 2016 users.

I can only hope they get enough backlash that they have to back peddle on this subscription based software as a service model, otherwise everything will go that way.
 
Subscription and cloud are here to stay.
Subscription and cloud are here to stay.
Subscription and cloud are here to stay.
Subscription and cloud are here to stay.
Subscription and cloud are here to stay.
That Bart Simpson writing on the board.
Good thing is the more this happens the EASIER is to move to the competing 'subscription and cloud'.
So as MS increases their profit for a time, they keep aiming better and better at their feet.
 
This is pretty much a non issue, the vast majority of business and enterprise customers have already moved over to office 365 or are on service agreements that include office. The revenue lost by loosing any users from this will be minor at best, because if having access to those services in any way played into their business needs they would upgrade readily and if they don't need them then they are still able to use their old versions with 0 functional loss in productivity. If those users start encountering problems than they may move over to LibreOffice which results in no loss on the part of Microsoft or they will upgrade so unless this decision actively makes users move off the platform then it can only help Microsoft in the long run.
 
We use Lync at work so I am guessing they'll do the upgrade for that purpose. At home the only MS products are Windows, Outlook, Excel, and Word, so no affect here. I will never use cloud for anything, so no affect here.
 
Ah man, don't ever change, Microsoft bashers. You still provide amazing drivel to laugh at even decades later. No one is trying to catch up to anything but office and windows, as well as visual Studio among others. I mean, when's the last time you heard someone say, "I hope windows gets to Linux share on the desktop" ? I rest my case.
 
jedijeb13 said:
I just use LibreOffice, have for a long time now. At work though I can't get our IT guy to even consider it. His first excuse is"there isn't any tech support", Seriously, we use office to send memos and make basic spreadsheets, who would need any kind of support for that which you can't get on the internet.
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I actually did the opposite in one place i worked. I would install openoffice, before libreoffice, on a system. Make a short cut for the spreadsheet/writer apps, then RENAME the shortcut WORD/EXCEL. Go in and change the default saves from odf to .doc/xls

never had any issues. There was only a couple people i had to keep with word for higher level graphics, and excel since the back end accounting software directly called excel.exe when doing exports with macros

everyone else got open office. also saved a lot of headache when MS changed the save formats to .docx/xlsx, as i just needed to update instead of buy a complete new set of software

oh yeah.. most people never knew they were NOT using MS office since they would be clicking on a shortcut that said WORD or EXCEL LOL
 
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KarsusTG said:
Oh please, the average user doesn't even know what Access is even used for...
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Let alone know how to use it. I've tried to learn in for a particular function but gave up after 3 years. Now I don't even want to look at it.
 
Oh the OneDrive for business that still has tons of sync issues using the client app? Or even when operating correctly used 2X the space in temp files because reasons. Or Skype 4 B that is a UDP game of Russian roulette to determine what device it will notify on, or if it will drop an IM conversation a few IM's in...

Perhaps get the product working right before figuring out how to limit it to certain customers.
 
KarsusTG said:
Oh please, the average user doesn't even know what Access is even used for...
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.. and the ones that do know Access make prying control out of their grimy peasant claws a pain when trying to put mission critical things on an actual database with actual backups and not a thumb drive. Not to mention the occasional flippant attitude of someone deemed the "guru" of their department when brought in to migrate their twenty year old shit Access project into something more relevant, secure, and feature friendly.
 
jardows said:
Case 1: Microsoft never changes anything, and we can all party like it's 1999! Then Microsoft is behind the times, needs to update, evolve, change their business model to survive

Case 2: Microsoft updates, evolves, changes their business model to survive in the modern computer era, and they are the vile evil of the world taking away our toys

Either way, I don't see how Microsoft can win. They might as well close up shop now and quit trying, since the Penguin overlords are an unstoppable force that will soon liberate (take over) the world!


Now, more seriously - a business decision that affects business users, just being used as an excuse by MS haters to hate more.
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I think most people are hating on Microsoft for the stupid way they tried to update/evolve. The jump from Windows 7 to Windows 8 was just terrible. They could have save a lot of grief if they kept the basic Windows 7 system and added a new optional phone/tablet interface that the user could use if they wanted. Also, the removal of control (updating) and graphical features didn't help mater either. Especially for us nerdier users.

These are the main reason I do my general computing/programing in Linux and only use Windows 10 for games.
 
My company doesn't use OneDrive or Skype.

Nothing of value is lost.

Not a single fuck is given.
 
Meeho said:
Case 3: They provide worthwile and logical updates and changes while not shitting up previous iterations.
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And people bitch that they ruined it. There is no change that everyone is going to like. Just look on here. Everyone bitches about Windows 10. Meanwhile in the real world, it's generally liked.
netmarketshare has it at 25% over all and on Steam it's at 51% (and climbing).

There's no way to please people. When they went to a full blown GUI and took away DOS access, people bitched. When, starting with Vista, they put in a system that made navigation by typing much better than before and, indeed, better than using a mouse, nobody noticed. Did even more in 7...and people bitched that the Windows 95 menu was gone.

Windows 10 changes and they bitch some more, even though the underlying search for what you want works very well. People complain that they have settings and Control panel (and I agree...they need to move everything to settings and dump Control Panel), but if you search from the start menu, what you want shows up.

The only way MS could make everyone happy is if they improved the system but also maintained every old UI too.
 
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