Well Anne, Going by the past I doubt it! Here in India there are various dubious software sales outlets and I guess that MS is trying to market their genuine software by making it a bit more attractive - some people would say why spend 380 dollars when you can get the same thing for less than 5!! Regards Ian ----- Original Message ----- From: Anne Robson To: mso@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 5:30 PM Subject: [mso] Re: Office 2003 Launch in NYC - an OT grumble Thanks Ian - I wonder if MS would be as generous to UK purchasers?!!! Anne -----Original Message----- From: mso-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:mso-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ian Elliott Sent: 27 October 2003 11:43 To: mso@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [mso] Re: Office 2003 Launch in NYC - an OT grumble I live in India, I just bought XP Office professional (2002) for the equivalent of $380.00 and it included a voucher for a free upgrade on CD to 2003! This is an original one from Microsoft and sounded to me like a good deal! I will let you know if there are any hitches with the 2003 upgrade discs! Regards Ian Elliott ----- Original Message ----- From: Anne Robson To: mso@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 3:23 PM Subject: [mso] Re: Office 2003 Launch in NYC - an OT grumble <Estimated retail Pricing (is largely unchanged from XP) and upgrades will be less: * Student/Teacher edition 2003: $149 * Standard edition: $399 * Professional edition: $499 * Stand alones are unchanged at $229 for Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint and $109 for Outlook 2003.> Dian I hate to take issue with things on this list but this is a bit different. Sometimes the hype really gets me down when ANY new product - Microsoft or otherwise - comes out. Does anything ever get said at these events about pricing differentials between different countries? Or the cost to small companies - I mean really small, like us ... Just 3 users - of paying for upgrades to software almost every year? The best price I've seen for an *upgrade* to Office XP 2003 Pro in the UK is GBP £250.99 or about $426 at today's exchange rate (Amazon, http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0000BX73E/ref=sr_aps_software_1_ 3/026-0380714-2219640 in case anybody is interested) which is way beyond our resources to pay for x 3, having had 2002 only for 6 months. Our company is in financial services, and although we are small we have to comply with a HUGE range of financial legislation, industry compliance and other restrictions, at great expense in terms of training and other factors. We will soon no doubt find ourselves in the situation we hit 6 months ago that the provider of one of our products, a major life assurance company, brought out software which initially would NOT work with XP, but in the short space of time since we acquired new hardware with XP pre-installed they have turned it round to the point where support for any pre-XP OS users will cease as of December. This is forcing small businesses into having to spend large sums of their turnover on hardware and software to keep up with changes that they don't otherwise need. Companies like ours can't work without computers now, for all sorts of reasons, but I really get upset when *improvements* I have no need for are forced on us at great cost. Bill Gates may have dropped from 1st place in the world's richest men ranking but it must take him a nanosecond to earn $500 so these issues are peanuts to him. My earning potential is rather slower and $500 makes a big impact in our spending power both as a business and as a family. It's about time MS started thinking about loyalty bonuses for clients who've stayed with them and increased Microsoft's profit base at the expense of their own liquidity. And looked at why it costs so much more to buy Microsoft in the UK than in the States. Sorry guys - I just feel really strongly about this - please accept my apologies everybody if I sound angry but I do think this needs to be said. Anne *ducking down waiting for the fur to fly* -----Original Message----- From: mso-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:mso-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Dian Chapman Sent: 26 October 2003 20:40 To: mso@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Cc: Word_VBA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; word-ms@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; MSOffice2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [mso] Office 2003 Launch in NYC --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). 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