Microsoft licensing is pushing you more and more to an online subscribtion

Playing with the new Office 2016 preview which is like Office 2013+ makes one thing clear to me: the licensing of Office gets more and more restricted and the on or off button is in Redmond. 

I personally don't like it when someone else decides when and what I can use if it concerns my operating system and my office suite. They are of vital importance and they should not work only when online, because to many times online is not available and in that case no Office.

Instead of making the preview freely available to as much users as possible to promote the product and to generate future sales, new users find themselves like me struggling with the license that suddenly expires and you can no longer change or even have access to your documents. There is no information, no dashboard, nothing. It is all secretly managed in Redmond.

When that happens you will run into timely uninstalls, reinstall, public product keys that should override the subscription licenses but in fact don't and then your stuck. Office is huge and installing takes easily 20 minutes on a SSD equipped computer.

This all is in sharp contrast with the (still) free Google Office applications which get better year by year and you just have to wait that they get so good that users massively switch over like they have done with the Windows Phone to Apple and Android. And next to that there is the Google Dashboard that shows you what is going on with all the products you use and gives you the possibility to manage it. Really way ahead of Microsoft, that seems to be stuck in their 25 years enigma of "It is MY product and I decide if you can use it".

Once a market is lost it is very hard to win it back. Users will be very forgiving if they like your product but ones something better is tested they are gone and all that use to be "not important" becomes the burden to never return again. 

For me personally it is a very sour experience if you take into account how much sales I have generated over the years for Microsoft. Millions and millions of Euros have passed through my hands on licensing and I received never a single flower of even a free license to thank you.And I am not the only one.

Check out this link for more info: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/does-your-copy-of-office-2013-die-with-your-computer-20130210-2e3a1.html