I didn't really absorb that statement the first time I read the o/p.  That does give the whole situation that little "extra special taste" doesn't it?

Actually it's MSs property and MS can decide what to offer whom as long as that decision is not based on gender, race, religion or orientation.

It just pisses me off that the IRS pays for the updates with taxpayer monies and gets a separate deal...despite MSs right to do that. If the IRS cared a whit, then they'd swing a deal at the same time for the next upgrade. Why isn't the OMB/OIG putting its/their 2 cents in? 

Indeed.

The thing here is, Microsoft has been wanting to retire XP for a couple years or more now, primarily so it can focus on supporting Win 7 and Win 8 while developing new technologies for Win 9 and beyond, so it does seem to defeat the purpose by extending XP support for the IRS and other paying customers.  It would have made more sense for MS to have shut the door on XP and offrered discount licenses on Win 7 instead, so while XP is theirs to do with as they wish, the decision to extend support defies logic when the company insists that it is moving forward to keep pace with emerging technologies.  In fact, it is somewhat disappointing that MS caved in to the almighty dollar and backtracked on its commitment to shift XP's resources to new and emerging softwares.

That might be true if W8 sales had been over the top...as is, they can't really say no to the government (they could, but it really wouldn't be very smart). You see, if they just said, "No", and a breach were to happen (especially at the VA-medical info or the IRS-financial info), they might be hit very hard with liability issues and public opinion.

If a breach were to occur, and the relevant department had neglected to upgrade like everyone else has had to, then surely the liability is their own public opinion would be that they brought it on themselves.  I mean, seriously, who has any sympathy for the government, much less the tax office?

For mine, your government, the IRS and other depertments still running XP are a bunch of woefully slack bastards who waste taxpayers money and fully deserve an enormous public backlach that truly puts the screws on them. 

The only person worse than a politician is a banker.

With all of this hate on the IRS, I wanted to make a clarification.

Don't waste your time shooting the messenger.

The IRS interprets and executes the tax laws written by Congress.

So, if you're pissed off about taxes, it's your friendly neighborhood congressman who should feel your wrath.

Very true, but, if everyone refused to fight in wars, what good would a declaration of war be? Even laws that go against your [US] constitution have to be enforced by people that swore an oath on that same document. The psychopaths in power may tell the people what to do, it still the peoples choice to do it, and the IRS has no shortage of scumbags that will eagerly ==retracted for political==. I know most of you will hit the edits button to see what's here, but please stay on topic.

One thing you have to keep in mind is that a lot of the tax code is intentionally written broadly/vaguely to allow for personal interpretation and "wiggle room".  (If it were all staright forward and cut and dry, there would be no need for tax attorneys...)

This gives corps and organizations the ability to read the code in a way that suits them. When these organizations push their interpretation too far, that's when the IRS steps in and says "hey, wait just a minute...."

Also, another thing that a lot of people don't realize is that much of the tax code is written by lobbyist. They write it up and hand it off to a polician who is willing to sponser it or tak credit for it. Most politicians (even the sponser) don't even bother to read the whole thing.

Not many love big corporations either, especially when shown to be milking us no less than the IRS.

Oh woe, an unholy union if ever there was one.... and castration/sterilisation should be compulsory prior to their joining so as to prevent the spawning of successors.

Maybe not, but Microsoft would have its brains trust go into damage control, plus it could sweeten public opinion towards it with discounts on various software titles, etc.  The government/IRS has nothing much it could use to counter-offer, except perhaps for more misery and pain, so MS would likely come out of it the better and smelling of roses, while the government/IRS reeked of manure.

you know how it goes. changing os means updating/rewriting the ancient programs that they've been using in xp and retraining people. most companies/organisations/entities think they are saving money by delaying that. if they can stick with something for 20 years as opposed to every 5 or whatever, you bet they'll do it.

i  can think of a very simple reason why ms offers support (at a price) to them and not individuals. those big entities will move off xp as part of some process. ms gets paid and might even get them to stick to newer windows.

whereas individuals would stick to their hardware until it goes boom and ms is forcing them to move on.

makes sense.

There is some 3rd party support for XP, but there are some limitations.

http://redmondmag.com/articles/2013/08/21/arkoon-windows-xp-security.aspx
Arkoon Network Security is planning to roll out its ExtendedXP product this fall for those organizations that just can't get off Windows XP.

"If there is a new vulnerability, the managed services team will report that back to them and potentially create a new template," Foley said. "All the customer has to do is apply the new template to the management console. It will automatically update all of the remote agents with the new protection."

One limitation to Arkoon's approach is that only Microsoft can update the Windows XP kernel, so the level of patch support isn't the same.

"The area where we will be the weakest will be in the area of kernel attachments," Foley said. "But we certainly also are not saying that we don't believe that ExtendedXP shouldn't be part of a multilayered solution. We are presuming, we recommend, that anyone using ExtendedXP also has a firewall. That they are also doing extra layers of protection, as they are hopefully doing today…. We are filling in one part of a multipart security strategy."