With all the hubbub surrounding XP’s impending day of doom, the fact that support for Microsoft Office 2003 ends on the exact same date seems to have been pushed well into the background.
Yes folks, as of April 8th there will be no more security updates forthcoming for Office 2003, which means no further patches to close as yet undiscovered vulnerabilities. As a none too gentle reminder, Microsoft recently put up a new post on its Office blog including an interesting infograph which shows just how much the computing world has changed in general over the past decade, since the launch of Office 2003.
While the 2003 software had a number of interesting features, including the first version of OneNote and the final version of Clippy, Microsoft is saying that individuals and businesses who are still using the software now need to move on – Microsoft is, of course, pushing its latest Office 365:
Office 2003 no longer meets the needs of the way we work, play and live today. For this reason, it is time to say farewell to Office 2003 and embrace the productivity solution of today – Office 365.
You’ll never have to worry about outdated software, security installs, or purchasing a CD with an installation code again – Office 365 is always up-to-date, equipped with built in security and available to purchase online (no CD required!)
I am not generally a fan of infographics but I thought this one was pretty neat:
Interesting!! So we’re all expected to embrace this change and go with the flow.
I don’t have Office 365 but I get the impression the new emphasis is saving documents in Online Drives in the “cloud” rather than the computer’s Hard Drive. This transition will be hard to accept.
Office 2003 still does everything I need it to do, and I don’t like the “cloud”
and I don’t like the Office 365 concept at all. I prefer to own the rights to use, and not rent the rights by the year.
I won’t store anything personal in the “cloud”, as no one knows who is reading it.
Before I rent/buy anything Microsoft I’ll start using Officelibre or something similar.
I still work with Office 2003 and I still have not explored all its capabilities.
Besides, I like owning things I buy. Owning means it’s in my home, under my guard, and I’m fully in control of what I do with them. (Okay, minus activation. That was a first step on the slope of “you pay it, bu it’s not really yours”.)
The whole concept of “give us some money (actually much more than you used to, once you factor in renewed annual spending), and we’ll happily keep your property with us, because we believe you can’t really be trusted to protect things we’ve sold to you” strikes me as perfectly ridiculous. How can anyone fall for such a scam ?
If only Microsoft had shown itself to be an honest and trustworthy dealer, it might be contemplated. I pay for some online services provided by companies which never tried to double-cross me. Can you say the same thing about Microsoft ?
As an added bonus, books about Office 2003 can now be bought for less than a dollar online. Now that’s a deal…