New SPLA Licensing Terms

Heads Up.

Forget everything you've learned about Windows Server "authenticated" and "unauthenticated" licensing for your monthly SPLA reports. The game has completely changed, and NOT for the better.

Microsoft has changed to "outsourcer" and "non-outsourcer" licensing instead.

Quoting Microsoft:

Quote:

"Outsourcing is an application or service that a service provider manages for their customer. For purposes of this definition, the managed application or service is:
(a) Used by its customer's employees, contractors, agents, or vendors
(b) Not the service provider's intellectual property

I contacted MS directly for clarification on how this applies to webhosting. The response was, if the service provider is (and I quote), "simply managing the infrastructure layer and not managing anything else... in other words just keeping the lights on", that is non-outsourced.

If you are providing any software or management of the environment, even something as simple as Windows Updates or other basic management tasks on the server-- which is the case, for example, if you are running a shared webserver, then it is "outsourced".

Your email server is providing a service that is considered an outsourced service, and you must report (and pay for) an "outsourced" license for that server.

And here is the bad news.

Under the old terms, the Datacenter edition of Windows Server (which allows unlimited VMs at no additional charge on the machine where the license is assigned) cost just under $50/month.

The new "outsourcer" Datacenter license is nearly $250/mo. Yes, you read that right, a whopping 400% monthly license fee increase for Datacenter edition.

A single copy of Windows Server Standard edition is over $75/mo. when used in the outsourcing role.

Other pricing and terms have changed as well, so grab a copy of the new SPUR and READ it. All it takes is a moment of uncertainty to put you wildly out of compliance under this new layer of insanity.