Microsoft defends the plan by saying that it simplifies its old Byzantine pricing structure, which customers had complained about. Customers say simplicity is fine - but not at the cost of control.

Anger about the new licensing plan reached a fever pitch in late 2001,when 15 percent of 122 respondents to an October 2001 CIO survey said they planned to sign up. More than a year later, that anger is still simmering, even in customers that went with the new program.

"We caved," says Tom Jeffery, vice president of IT at Pittsfield, Mass.-based retailer KB Toys, who estimates that KB will pay $135,000 per year more for Microsoft products under the new plan. "We felt strong-armed into doing this. But because we don't have any other option, we felt we just had to play the game."

But many still aren't playing. Though Microsoft's deadline for customers to sign up for the new licensing plan passed at the end of July 2002, by November a new CIO survey of 375 IT executives found that 51 percent of respondents still had not upgraded to Microsoft's new product line, XP. Now, if they do, they'll have to pay the full price, even if they already have older versions of Windows software.

Who wouldn't be angry?