A Windows 10 user is suing Microsoft for the "forced obsolescence" of cutting support for his two laptops. Lawrence Klien says it's an anticompetitive attempt to dominate the generative AI market.

The lawsuit seems to be more about making a point than changing Microsoft's plans. It isn't seeking a financial fortune and the timeline makes it almost impossible it will have a practical effect.

Klein makes many valid points in his filing, most of which will be familiar to those who've followed the story. His two laptops cannot upgrade to Windows 11 because they don't have TPM (trusted platform module), which is a hardware security feature.

He argues this will unnecessarily make them obsolescent when Microsoft stops supporting Windows 10. Officially that takes place at the end of October, 2025, though the company is offering a year of additional security updates for consumers in return for paying a fee, redeeming Microsoft Store points (which can be earned by using Bing for searches) or backing up Microsoft settings to the cloud. All these options require creating a Microsoft account, which is not strictly necessary to run Windows 10.

Legal Challenge

The problem is that while this is a good argument that Microsoft is behaving in a consumer unfriendly way, it doesn't necessarily mean they are doing anything legally wrong. Klein uses a slightly indirect argument that Microsoft is exploiting its dominance in one area (operating systems) to try to gain similar monopoly power in another (generative AI).

He notes Microsoft is effectively making Windows 11 the only supported system just four years after its release, which he cites as evidence of an unusual and deliberate move given it's normally been seven or eight years before that happens. (Source: pcgamer.com)

He then says this is being done to get more people using Microsoft's Copilot AI system. He even argues that Microsoft deliberately stopped supporting Windows 10 was because existing machines don't have a special chip which gives the best performance on Copilot. That's a bit of a stretch because even people buying a new machine to get Windows 11 aren't being forced to buy these special machines known as Copilot+ devices.

No Financial Demand

Often consumer cases against tech giants seek to collect huge damages, get class action status to allow thousands of other users to join the claim, or both. That's not what Klein is doing. He's not only asking for his legal fees to be covered, but for the court to order that it can't stop supporting Windows 10 until less than 10% of Windows users are still running the system. (Source: courthousenews.com)

The big problem is that even if a court did agree to that request, its highly unlikely the case would be completed (let alone the inevitable appeals heard) until after October, 2025, at which point the order would be too late. At that point the only way to achieve Klein's demand would be to make Microsoft refund people who'd paid the fee for extended security support, something a court would likely be much more hesitant to do.

What's Your Opinion?

Should this lawsuit succeed? Does it matter why Microsoft is really pulling the plug on Windows 10 support? Is such a case the best way to try to influence Microsoft's policies?