Microsoft Moves To Patent Time-Based Software Licensing

theodp writes "Microsoft's Open Value Subscription offering didn't get the warmest reception. Nor did the follow-up announcement of Albany, a planned MS-Office Subscription Service. Now comes word from the USPTO that Microsoft feels it deserves a patent for the 'invention' of 'Time-Based Licensing,' which aims to make the traditional pay-once perpetual license model a thing of the past. Hey, if your customers were waiting nine years between OS upgrades, you'd try touting a three-year lease with a balloon buy-out payment, too!"

Re:Traditional model a thing of the past? Really?

[camperslo]

NASA please test!

It's believed there may be water in the soil in Redmond

Re:Matlab

[Tablizer]

Invention? What the heck are they talking about? My Matlab license has been time-based for years. I remember one day Matlab stopped working for me because I never got around to entering the new license number that our IT folks emailled me a few weeks earlier.

I find htat venders uzwolly forgit to tern off feeturs. Four exampul, my spail chekker lisense ran out, butt it steal fixes all my werds just fyne, flaging and perviding opshuns az uzwoll. Woodent that bee funnie iff it listed rong werds aftur? Ha, I probly woodent notiss teh differns anyhowl.
       

Re:Matlab

[networkBoy]

prior to expiring you should have used Matlab to brute force the algorithm for generating keys...
But you forgot to do that, so you had to go and retrieve that e-mail. How silly.

Whoa.

[Kingrames]

STAND BACK!

I'm going to attempt time travel.

Re:Traditional model a thing of the past? Really?

[Tablizer]

NASA please test! It's believed there may be water in the soil in Redmond

That's not water, it just looks like water from afar. It's a blue screen with little white letters.