Charlie+ wrote:

1) Has Milkro$oft published anything regarding how long they will
be keeping their update server on-line to provide the library of
XP patches and updates for anyone caring to download them?

2) Has Milkro$oft published anything regarding how long they will
be keeping their validation server running to perform on-line
validation of new installations of XP?

No and No

Fine. A straightforward, concise, honest answer.

and dont expect MS to answer these questions either, why should
they tie their own hands in any way by guessing into the future?

And a sycophantic answer from a Macro$haft appologist, covering for them
and explaining away their cowardly behavior in not deciding to carve a
date in stone regarding two very important aspects of the life cycle of
one of their products.

Really - there is no reason to defend Micro$haft in that manner.

You can at least admit that they are acting like cowards by not having
the balls to declare some sort of date for the ending of those 2
services.

There is precedent for the update server to no longer supply or be
functional for one or two of their products, as WindowsUpdate went dark
for win-98 I think 2 years after win98 EOL. I don't know what happened
for Win-2k in that regard - I presume that WindowsUpdate service no
longer functions for win2k - correct? But in any case, it came as a
surprise when the update service failed for win-98.

But there is -NO- precedent for Meekro$oft turning off its validation
server or failing to validate product keys, and I think it's cowardly
for such an organization to not announce publicly what their police is
or will be for such an important function, and anyone involved in IT
would be correct in expecting to see such a policy in writing.