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It's pretty hard to get upset about this since nobody actually runs Windows Server on the Cloud anyway. Even Azure is dominated by Linux server usage.
Also if your stack is .NET you definitely need Windows Server. Even Amazon has some things built on .NET/Windows Server (woot.com)
Now I am curious, who runs production customer facing apps on Azure? I'm assuming many people do given that Azure is second after AWS in market share or is that really just mostly corporate IT servers?
Well this article doesn't seem very good. Not least because the author seems perfectly willing to not actually explain the detail, and then jump to conclusions. Having read the actual detailed article what seems to be happening is that some customers buy "on-premises licenses" without mobility rights, and MSFT used to let them use those licenses on outsourced hardware. But people were using those licenses to just put…
But you forgot to tell us WHY it is acceptable for Microsoft to charge their customers a premium for using their fully purchased licenses on a cloud provider of their choice rather than dedicated physical hardware. And why it is ok for Microsoft to create an artificial monopoly for these licenses via Azure Dedicated Host.
Microsoft sold licenses that could be used this way, customers used them this way, and now Microsoft wants to double-dip asking their customers to pay twice just to actually use their already owned licenses.
> What it sounds like is happening at the moment is Amazon is running a shit tonne of MSFT software without any MSFT licenses. Which sounds pretty cheeky to me.
That's not what is happening. People are buying Windows Server licenses and running them on compute that they rent from AWS. Until this change, that was completely inside the terms of Windows Server licenses (if for no other reason that they've been pushing hypervisor-based Windows Server virtualization for almost ten years).
Well this article doesn't seem very good. Not least because the author seems perfectly willing to not actually explain the detail, and then jump to conclusions. Having read the actual detailed article what seems to be happening is that some customers buy "on-premises licenses" without mobility rights, and MSFT used to let them use those licenses on outsourced hardware. But people were using those licenses to just put…
Any other cloud hosting provider, say Rackspace, can be used with on-premise licenses.
Now I am curious, who runs production customer facing apps on Azure? I'm assuming many people do given that Azure is second after AWS in market share or is that really just mostly corporate IT servers?
Wait, there are people who genuinely believe this?
All Windows servers on Azure already have to have "Software assurance". The license T&C for the last few years have been fairly clear you need to pay for software assurance to cloud host. Are they not simply closing the loophole where direct customers are paying more ?
I don't think that AWS/GCP guarantee that you are on a specific host for any period of time, and I think that in many scenarios, you cannot move Windows Server workloads more than once in any 30-day period. I think Microsoft's position is that customers on these platforms are likely breaking that rule.
That said, those same rules apply to ESX and HyperV, and Microsoft doesn't blacklist vMotion because it can violate an agreement. Many people see these sorts of actions as a part of a pattern where Microsoft is leveraging the existing license rights to drive Azure. That's how they are providing Windows Server 2008 extended security updates as well.
Well this article doesn't seem very good. Not least because the author seems perfectly willing to not actually explain the detail, and then jump to conclusions. Having read the actual detailed article what seems to be happening is that some customers buy "on-premises licenses" without mobility rights, and MSFT used to let them use those licenses on outsourced hardware. But people were using those licenses to just put…
You seem to think simply re-stating the facts is enough to dismiss the article. But you forgot to tell us WHY it is acceptable for Microsoft to charge their customers a premium for using their fully purchased licenses on a cloud provider of their choice rather than dedicated physical hardware. And why it is ok for Microsoft to create an artificial monopoly for these licenses via Azure Dedicated Host. Microsoft sold l…
Why is it okay for Apple to legally restrict OS X from running inside a VM or on a PC?
Welcome to price differentiation.
Well this article doesn't seem very good. Not least because the author seems perfectly willing to not actually explain the detail, and then jump to conclusions. Having read the actual detailed article what seems to be happening is that some customers buy "on-premises licenses" without mobility rights, and MSFT used to let them use those licenses on outsourced hardware. But people were using those licenses to just put…
The change also applies only to the big four cloud providers: Microsoft, Alibaba, Amazon and Google. Any other cloud hosting provider, say Rackspace, can be used with on-premise licenses.
Hopefully the US Government doesn't deem Windows Server a monopoly or they're in deep trouble.
It's pretty hard to get upset about this since nobody actually runs Windows Server on the Cloud anyway. Even Azure is dominated by Linux server usage.