Since rolling back to the previous configuration will present a challenge, affected users will be faced with finding out just how effective their backup strategy is or paying for the required license and dealing with all the changes that come with Windows Server 2025.
Accidentally force your customers to have to spend money to upgrade, how convenient.
MS didn't force it, Heimdal auto-updated it for their customers based on the assumption that Microsoft would label the update properly instead of it being labeled as a regular security patch. Microsoft however made a mistake (on purpose or not? Who knows...) in labeling it.
MS will be sued over this and they will lose. This is not an ambiguous case. They fucked up. It’s essentially an unconsentual/unilateral alteration to a contract, which kinda violates the principle of, you know, a contract.
This would be no different to you ordering food in a restaurant, them bringing you the wrong meal, you refusing because you didn't order it, then they tell you to go fuck yourself and charge you for it anyway.
If this argument is valid in your judicial system then you live in a clown world capitalist dictatorship.
I'm saying they might send people the bill and then these people (well, companies) are going to have to fight it in court, where they'll be right for sure, but Microsoft can make a lot of stupid arguments to prolong the whole thing, to the point where it's cheaper to pay the license fee. For one they could say that continued use of the operating system constitutes agreement to licenses and pricing.
Either way this is server 2025 not windows 12. We're talking about companies here, not people.
Yes, and I'm saying that the fact this could even be viewed by Microsoft as something that is worth going to trial, and being argued in court = hyper-capitalist dystopian dictatorship.
In a sane world not "by and for corporations", this tactic would not even be in the realm of plausibility.
M$'s mistake creates no obligation to pay, either way. They cannot sue anyone for the extra money.
But some customers (depending on their legislation) might sue M$ to make broken systems running again, for example if these systems have stopped now with a 'missing license' error message.