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Office 2010, a set of Windows productivity applications — notably Word, Excel and PowerPoint
— debuted in April 2010 and received Microsoft's then-standard decade of support. Office 2016
for Mac, which was released in September 2015, was allotted only five years of support, the maxi-
mum for a Mac-based bundle.

Both are what Microsoft calls "perpetual" versions of its application suite, the term derived from
the type of license the company sells customers. Buyers pay a one-time fee for the product, which
is then licensed to operate on a specific PC or Mac for as long as the user wants, even after support
has ended if he or she is willing to risk the lack of security patches.

Microsoft has released perpetual successors to Office 2010 — both Office 2016 and Office 2019
— and Office 2016 for Mac (Office 2019 for Mac). However, they received nothing more than a
mention by Microsoft as possible replacements for the expiring suites.

In fact, Microsoft 365 Apps — again, realized via Office 365/Microsoft 365 subscriptions — are
the company's default. Microsoft's position is that application software-by-subscription is the inev-
itable end game for all customers.

"We understand that everyone is at a different stage of their journey to the cloud, and we're com-
mitted to supporting our customers throughout their transition to Microsoft 365 Apps.

The choice of "everyone" was telling.

Microsoft also reduced the choice for those who might not choose the by-subscription Microsoft
365 Apps to a very narrow set of options. For those customers who ... have a specific need for on-
premises or hybrid deployment, such as fully disconnected or restricted environments, they offer
Office 2019, the perpetual version of Office that does not receive feature updates.

Microsoft has made no secret of its desire to put customers on the regularly-paying subscriber
rolls. Nor has it been shy about touting Office 365 at the expense of perpetual alternatives, such as
Office 2019.

All is not lost if you don’t want to go down the subscription route, we have looked at the likes of
Libre Office in the past and I know some members use that package all the time. There are several
other similar packages that are available to download for free, it all come down to personal choice.

If you are looking for an office suite that supported by a large company then you could forget Of-
fice 365 and look at Google's new Workspace includes improved Gmail, Drive and Meet.

GOOGLE is now rivalling Microsoft Office 365 with a new service called Workspace, which
brings all of its most popular productivity apps into one place.
Microsoft's Office 365 subscription service now faces some tough competition from the team at

Google. The US firm has announced the launch of a new service, known as Google Workspace,
which they say includes everything you need to get anything done, all in one place.