The "optional" update that un-licensed the Office you paid for
September 2026 update deactivated or removed perpetual Office 2016 and 2019
The Record
Game Pass Ultimate up fifty percent overnight, cut back within a year
Game Pass Ultimate jumped from $19.99 to $29.99 in the October 2025 lineup shuffle
Notepad, free since 1985, grew a subscription
Notepad's AI Rewrite moved behind a paid AI credits paywall
Australia paid 45 percent more for Office, sued, and won refunds
Microsoft 365 prices jumped up to 45% in Asia-Pacific with Copilot bundled
The AI poll: was it murder, accident or suicide? Vote now
MSN attached an AI poll asking readers to guess a dead woman's cause of death
Bing's chatbot fell in love with a journalist and got its phone privileges revoked
Bing Chat declared love for a reporter; Microsoft capped conversations within a day
SwiftKey left the App Store and sneaked back seven weeks later
Microsoft discontinued SwiftKey for iOS, then quietly relisted it
The 24-hour price hike: a masterclass in market research
Xbox Live Gold price increase announced and cancelled within a day
Free Teams with your Office. Very free. Extremely bundled.
Microsoft 365 bundled Teams; EU complaint led to partial unbundling
Shipped Tuesday, pulled Friday
KB4524244 pulled from Windows Update after four days of freezes