Microsoft sending AI mails to raise your 365 but if you say you will cancel they back off

Cancel anyway and just use LibreOffice or OnlyOffice...

I struggle with Linux- though I still use it on my Internet machine... But libre office isn't any more difficult that MS office. Also you don't get ransomed for money on a very simple product. I don't understand why people pay for this bullshit.
- LibreOffice is available on MacOS and Windows as well
  I'd argue it is easier to operate than MS office, because the UI doesn't change basically under your cursor with every f*cking update
- For anyone disliking LibreOffice interface layout, OnlyOffice has very similar tabbed interface as MS Office.
I've used LibreOffice (or OpenOffice as it was known before), and a problem with this approach is that your family will still constantly ask you to install Office and crack it for them. And those who don't know any better will ask your help to open the PowerPoint their friends keep sending them.
Not to mention that LibreOffice doesn't have an easy to integrate backup solution, nor an easy way to share big photo folders, let alone a decent mail client.
LibreOffice is a good thing at what it wants to be. But it's not comparable to what MS is offering in the form of a subscription though. You don't just switch and only replace the word and excel alternative...
- There are perfectly good open source solutions for all those things. Admittedly, that is going to take more work than just paying the Redmond tax. But you can't have digital sovereignty without putting in some effort.
- 99% of home users would do just fine even with Wordpad. But everyone was hooked on MS Office. Even myself. But I was just annoyed chasing new versions and looking for cracks for them. That was years ago when I migrated to EasyOffice which was free alternative. Then came OpenOffice and LibreOffice. Now I'm using OpenOffice because it's less bloated than LibreOffice and just has 3 basic tools, Writer, Spreadsheets and Presentation and that's that. LibreOffice installs bunch of stuff I don't need and there is no way to adjust that during install.

I had forgotten that people are seriously paying for office software in 2025.

Majority of people don't even have ad blockers. I've talked with tech journalists that don't know what open source means.
- Those were hipsters, they get often confused.
- Clearly they're shit at their jobs.
There are a few features in 365 that are not built into opens source options, most them are accessibility feature.
- FOSS really does need to up its game when it comes to accessibility features. I feel like there's a culture issue. People need to be focusing on those features right from the start, but it's not even an afterthought. You'll get 5+ different iterations of basically the same program and not a one will have any accessibility features that aren't already built into the platforms that they're using, because everyone wants to do the "shiny" stuff.
  I'd really like to see a foundation set up specifically for accessibility in FOSS. Hopefully taking grants, hiring full time devs and dedicating to coding and maintaining those features for a specific subset of projects.

I never received email from LibreOffice. I love LibreOffice.

Same, although I've recently found I love OnlyOffice more, but they don't mind being in a love triangle. We're putting the open into open source.
- Pretty sure openoffice stopped receiving security updates

Sounds like deceptive business practices to me

Yeah it's weird and depressing how this is even legal. It's one thing to have to increase your prices, but what they seem to be doing here is automatically upgrading your subscription to something other than what you signed up for, when the original thing is still available as an option.
You wouldn't tolerate it in any other industry, but big tech moves so much faster than legislators, that they get to establish newer and shittier norms way before the geriatrics in government figure out what they're even looking at.

this would make me cancel anyways. I've already put the effort in, you've already tried to trick me, fuck you

It gets better. I went to cancel, got the old price (and confirmed it) and they still gave me CoPilot.

Amazon did the same thing with Prime, changed everyone to an ad-infested plan for the same price and created a new, ad-free tier for a higher price, and claims this change isn't a price increase.

Spotify did the same thing when they raised everyone's prices but started bundling audiobooks with music, but left behind the old, audio-book free plan for the old price without telling anyone.

I don't feel bad for pirating as long as the middlemen of media continue to pull underhanded tactics like this.

Corpo don't feel bad about fucking us... Why should plebs give a fuck about them?
I never understood poor losers moralizing businesses decisions. Juvenile behaviour
I had heard that amazon was planning on moving to an ad supported thing but I never ever saw an ad, either my pihole system blocked the ads or the ads came after January.

They think AI is a desirable thing that consumers want, that's why they charge more for the one with it.

I'm pretty sure they're aware that no one cares, but also that they think they can make us dependent on it if they cram it down our throats enough.
I also think that the bubble will burst when investors realize that it's never gonna happen.
While studies say that consumers buy less if the product advertises AI. But whatever the evidence says, because capitalism raised a bunch of psychopaths to the top.

LOL imagine paying for 356 when Libre Office exists.

But Libre won't let me rent an imaginary 1TB hard drive for $90/year.
Where will I store my stuff?!
- You can rent imaginary hard drives from other Canadian companies and presto chango if you need cloud space you can use that.

You can still acquire non-365 licenses that also come bullshit-free with no AI.

Once those are no longer available, I’m sure I’ll be fully over on Linux/LibreOffice by that time.

Ive been on LibreOffice. No complaints from professors about it so, I'm assuming no one can actually tell I'm using LibreOffice.
- I actually had a better time with LibreOffice in school.
  There were a number of times professors submitted word docs with instructions in tables that didn't render properly in Word but rendered fine in Libreoffice Writer.
  I've also had classes that used csv spreadsheets with a non-comma delimiter. It was very easy to switch the delimiter in Calc. But the professor had to resubmit a xlsx for everyone using excel.
- I'm assuming no one can actually tell I'm using LibreOffice.
  Trace formatting issues aside, it will show up in other subtle ways such as smaller *.docx files and cleaner doc-to-PDF conversions.
- non zero chance at least some of them are, too

I don't care about Office, I don't care about AI. I just want to keep my Skydrive...

I got the same email, and the same offer. Canceled anyway, because fuck them, that's why.

I do this with Internet/cable companies. Whenever I move I get the promotional price for a year. Then after a year I call them up and complain about the price increase and they extend the promotion. I've done that every year for the past 15 years.

I tried it and they didn't care. So I cancelled switched providers until their promotion ran out then switched back.
I think the Sales executives want this. They get bonuses for new customers. If no one switched they wouldn't get their bonus. So as long as the competitors are getting customers to leave, they try to get their own customers to leave too.
- Most places I've been, the company has a monopoly and my only other choice I satellite, which often sucks.

I just canceled it entirely when they started the AI charges. I've not missed it for a minute.

This is why we all need to start self hosting open source office things. I realize that is hard for people but if you want the cloud stuff of 365 that needs to happen, if you do not need the cloud stuff than just get libreoffice.

They're trying to see how much customers will bear, and don't want to lose them if they won't. It's shitty price discovery enabled by technology.

Haha I had the exact same. Only discovered the extra charge was only for AI I don't want when I tried to stop regular payments.

They back off for now.

It's been a while since I got that mail, and made sure I have the none AI version, but isn't it mentioned in the mail itself? Or in a link from the mail?