Microsoft Office 2019 and 2021 for Mac view-only conversion

superkuh

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.

crest

This should be treated as an organised crime syndicate stealing the purchase price from every customer.

ronbenton

I’m shocked I say. Shocked.

dangus

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.

notamario

Yarr, this be thievery.

nikcub

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...

thunfischtoast

When the pirated version is truer to the original contract than the official version. What a time to be alive.

nytesky

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 …

____tom____

So, do I just disable updates? How do I do that?

userbinator

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.

bastawhiz

Interesting that the deadline is checks notes one day before the Nightmare deadline. Definitely not a coincidence, right?

jefecoon

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.

g023

When did "hate the customer" become a thing?

drnick1

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.

IFC_LLC

The best company to do Microsoft in is Microsoft. They are responsible for awesome sales of MacBook Neo.

dmitrygr

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.

systemBuilder

Only morons use microsoft office products willingly. Haven't bought a copy of office, ever. I used to buy corporate laptops for $200 with $250 copies of office on them. Have been 100% on google docs since 2015.

866-RON-0-FEZ

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.

nullhole

s/perpetual/permanent perpetual has pejorative connotations and only started appearing in marketing speak when software rental became the new business model.

themadturk

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.