"Peter Duniho" wrote in
:

Of course, with product activation, there's no such thing as a perpetual
license anymore. So you do effectively have a subscription...you just
pay for it once, and it runs out whenever Microsoft decides you should
stop using their software (well, you can keep using it until the first
time you have to reinstall it, anyway).

That's an interesting point...

Do you think Microsoft will prohibit Windows XP users from operating once
they deprecate that operating system? Presumably it's a ways away, but I
believe Windows XP SP 1 was officially deprecated in October '06...