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Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

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Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#391

Post by tcfhgj »

wvenable wrote: post #248
rawbot wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Excel is the best spreadsheet software in my experience when you have to move beyond the basics. I’ve even tried hard to use the open/Libre alternatives. I agree 100% with this, since I've been trying the same. Although I do think some power-users take it way too far and should be using more robust data analysis tools (Python, DBs) instead of having these monstrous Excel spreadsheets with millions of rows and colum…

> power-users take it way too far and should be using more robust data analysis tools (Python, DBs) But they they wouldn't be power-users anymore, they'd be developers. It's just an entirely different world.

excel power users are developers

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#392

Post by azalemeth »

Angostura wrote: post #48
boh wrote: post #25

If most companies had to for some reason revert to Windows XP and MS Office from 1998, they would barely be impacted. There is literally no benefit to this subscription model besides paying for what you already have and what you don't want. None of this stuff needs to be on the cloud even for bigger firms. For the I need/like X in Office 365, it's not worth it from a costs perspective.

I'd disagree in terms of the cloud capabilities. When it is used properly . The cloud stuff is very useful. I currently have a document that is going through multiple versions with about 8 people, with different expertise collaborating. Some have edit privs, some only have review. The ability for everyone to work on it simultaneously, with version history and no more document-v12-copy3_FINAL_FINALv2 is most welcome.

This is why Google Docs was so revolutionary... In 2006.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#393

Post by tcfhgj »

AnonHP wrote: post #162
Aurornis wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excel is the best spreadsheet software in my experience when you have to move beyond the basics. I’ve even tried hard to use the open/Libre alternatives. Hacker News is a different world than the target customer base for these products. If your use case for spreadsheet software is putting things into tables with some formatting and some light formulas then all of the products will do the same job. For professionals w…

> Excel is the best spreadsheet software in my experience when you have to move beyond the basics. I’ve even tried hard to use the open/Libre alternatives. I strongly agree, but even for the basics! I use LibreOffice for personal use and put up with it only because it’s not Microsoft. It’s laggy, copy paste sometimes doesn’t work, the user interface is quite dated, the fonts are ugly…the list goes on. I donate to Doc…

I have used Typst as an alternative for spreadsheet use cases.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#394

Post by simonjgreen »

redserk wrote: post #128
gruez wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So a 16% hike when current US inflation is 3-4%? When was the last price hike? Looking at historical inflation and working backwards, you only need to start at around late 2021 to get 16% cumulative inflation. In other words if they didn't raise their prices for 4 years, they'd be at par with inflation. edit: another commenter mentioned the last price hike was around 4 years ago, so it's indeed in line with inflatio…

Since when does any organization factor in inflation for renewals from vendors?! All the purchase renewal decisions I've been part of have been: 1) Will they budge on renewal rates? 2) Does an alternative vendor exist? 3) Is the increase reasonable compared to the cost of switching to an alternative? 4) Do we anticipate future price increases, and if so, how can we prepare ourselves to consider a switch in the future…

Any experienced procurement or FP&A team will be doing this

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#395

Post by wkat4242 »

One thing I can't find is what the new prices will be for the versions without teams. There's special EEA versions of those SKUs. Or will they just not change?

I don't use much of it (just email and onedrive) and I can even drop onedrive if I need to (so just use exchange online plan 1). But if the teams-less version is not rising in price I might stick with that.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#396

Post by ivan_gammel »

wvenable wrote: post #243
amanzi wrote: post #240

Here in NZ, pretty much all medium/large businesses and govt departments have gone all-in with M365. Most govt departments are on the E5 licence, and have also started to roll out the Copilot licences too. The cost and complexity and the effort required to switch away from M365 is massive. It's not just using a different version of Excel and Word - that's the least of the issues. It's all the data stored in SharePoin…

> The cost and complexity and the effort required to switch away from M365 is massive. I'd say further to that is there literally isn't a similar product that exists to switch to. Nobody has developed a real alternative. It seems like most companies are more than willing to leave this entire market to Microsoft.

It is perfectly possible to run a company with at least 1k employees on non-MS stack, throwing a bone of Office apps to (small) legal and accounting teams, so that they approve the budget. I did that before.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#397

Post by ivan_gammel »

wvenable wrote: post #364
conception wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft is a buffet. You can get anything you want but it’s rare people leave a buffet saying “Man that food was great!” Usually people go to different places for different things of better quality. This is clear because there are lots of very successful competing products to Microsoft’s buffet. The only moat I’d say Microsoft actually has is Excel. And maybe Powerpoint. Everything else can be replaced easily and o…

> This is clear because there are lots of very successful competing products to Microsoft’s buffet. Is there? Maybe Google docs. It's amazing that Microsoft has, for the most part, not really changed their fundamental office software for over a decade and yet there is very little actual competition. People call it bland but I've yet to see any real competition to the whole package.

The truth is, only a fraction of your users needs MS products so much that they will die on this hill. Legal, accounting, maybe procurement. That’s it. For everyone else Google Docs are actually better.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#398

Post by tsimionescu »

MangoToupe wrote: post #336
paulddraper wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suggesting libreoffice as an alternative to Office 365 is crazy.

Why? What feature does office 365 have that is so difficult to replace? I'm guessing support but... is there something more obvious? Full disclosure, I haven't used microsoft office in a few decades.

Libre office can mostly replace Word, Excel, PowerPoint. But Office 365 or M365 (or whatever the brand name is today) is a huge suite of cloud collaboration and administration tools, including personal and corporate-level cloud storage, app delivery, integration with enterprise accounts and other corporate tools, email, and many other more niche/obscure things. At this point, Microsoft could probably discontinue Word, Excel, and PowerPoint and still not lose many M365 customers.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#399

Post by ivan_gammel »

conception wrote: post #352
wvenable wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The cost and complexity and the effort required to switch away from M365 is massive. I'd say further to that is there literally isn't a similar product that exists to switch to. Nobody has developed a real alternative. It seems like most companies are more than willing to leave this entire market to Microsoft.

Microsoft is a buffet. You can get anything you want but it’s rare people leave a buffet saying “Man that food was great!” Usually people go to different places for different things of better quality. This is clear because there are lots of very successful competing products to Microsoft’s buffet. The only moat I’d say Microsoft actually has is Excel. And maybe Powerpoint. Everything else can be replaced easily and o…

Google Sheets can do a lot, especially if you have automation tool like Zapier. Excel is no longer a moat or the moat. Powerpoint… jain. It’s cool, but Miro and Figma eat that cake nowadays.

Re: Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices

#400

Post by semyonsh »

zerofor_conduct wrote: post #264
mrbluecoat wrote: post #100

Switched to the free OnlyOffice a year ago and never looked back: https://www.onlyoffice.com/desktop https://github.com/ONLYOFFICE

here is a (somewhat biased) comparison between OnlyOffice and Collabora Online https://www.collaboraonline.com/comparing-collabora-with-onl...

"Somewhat biased" is a gross understatement here, holy crap.
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