Microsoft up to it's old tricks

Microsoft delays Office release for Mac


...as did Microsoft's move to a new file format with the release of Office 2007 for Windows-based computers.


I remember this. Every new operating system gets a new upgrade to office whatever , that only runs on that operating system and nothing less. And the files it produces cannot be read by earlier versions of the office product.

I was working as a programmer at the time, we had just made the jump from windows 3.1 to win95 , which was brand new at the time. Our client had upgraded to the latest microsoft office , and sent us emails , from word , in word format ! on what they wanted next with our product.

Of course we couldn't read the emails and it took a while for us to figure out what had happened. When we did , well , our client was a federal government department , and they'd all upgraded and thrown away their old microsoft offices , and they had no intention of going back. So we were forced, against our better judgement , to upgrade too. Which cost a couple of hundred dollars for one copy. Which left my boss ranting and ticked off for a couple of days. (it was a small 3 man office at the time)

It's a scam.

There was nothing the new version of office did that the old couldn't do. Just a straight matter of the new version was incompatable with the old.

It's an old scam , still going on , I see.