Office XP

I definitely agree. Office XP is a sweet piece of software.

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Martee

I must also agree: Office XP is pretty slick. If I had bought my computer only 2 months later, I''d have gotten it instead of Office 2000.

Not to get much on a soap box but MS actually can put out pretty cool software. Visual C++ is an awesome IDE. Say what you want about unfair pratices against Borland but it is a great app. MS has a habit of making stuff that sucks and improving upon it till it is great. From what I''ve Windows XP is supposed to be pretty good - personally I loved 2K.

My problem is things like their "renting" of your software. Who wants to pay $200 a year just to keep using your software? Its basically a standard designed soley to shaft the customer. These days I''m sorry I spent so much effort sticking up for them.

I don''t entirely get this renting of software thing either. How it is suppose to be designed, is you only pay for the software as long as you use it, and then once your done, you stop paying...

I think it was done in the intent of saving people money on upgrades, patches, etc., but I feel it only makes the stuff cost more...

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Bow Down before Daytanea the Computer Goddess of AI,
lest she reboot your bios to her liking

The idea is that instead of purchasing a $600 copy of Office...you pay $200/yr ($17/mo) and get upgrades as apart of the deal...so when Office 2004 comes out, you''ll get it as long as you keep paying your $17/mo.
There are obvious issues that a lot of people have...people in general prefer to own something...or at least have the appearance of owning. People prefer "owning" homes, buying cars, etc...even though they pay monthly bills, there''s still the illusion of ownership.

Renting software on the other hand...the illusion is pretty thin.


Epolevne

The reason for the renting is that, basically, poeple don''t upgrade. The majority of the computing public isn''t racing out to get a P4 or WindowsXP (when it comes out). MS feels this pinch even more since the great majority of poeple who want a computer already have one - and probably are happy with it.

Enter software renting. Under the guise of offering patches and such MS puts this in. It solves the lack of interest in the upgrade problem and brings them in money. What does it buy us, the consumer? Well, patches have been typically free so basically we are paying to be forced to patch. While perhaps the tendency here for gamedev users is to upgrade on a regular basis, again, most people do not. And why should you be forced too? If you current software does all you need what''s the point? Today if we want to upgrade we pay for it, get it and (hopefully) go home happy. Tomorrow, we will be FORCED to get the upgrade, lest our software shut down. Personally I think that''s the lamest thing MS has tried to pull.

Sieggy