It kind of is. Expecting support for such old software is indeed unreasonable. But this is not asking for support, bug fixes, running on new platforms, or anything like that. It's people wanting to continue using the software they bought fair and square (rather than getting for free or subscribing to), and would still be able to run without this license check. How is that an unreasonable expectation? If MS doesn't want to keep the activation servers running, then they should release a patch that removes the license check.

By coincidence, my dad was just telling me this week that he'd recently bought a shrink-wrap copy of Office 2010 or 2013, couldn't activate it automatically, and while MS phone support was reluctant to activate it they eventually found some kind of a workaround.

It is. Software doesn't rust. My old copy of Office 2000 still works perfectly fine -- with Wine. Windows 2000 and Office 2000 were the last versions I bought. When M$ switched to activation-based "copy protection", I moved on to Linux and never looked back.

But the thing is: You pay for something, and it works. Then, just 11 years after the sale, the product suddenly stops working, just because someone said so, even though it's still in perfect condition. That's a nope from me. Imagine you buy new shoes, and after a while you suddenly can't put them on anymore. Or an oven doesn't work anymore after just 11 years. With M$ stuff it seems to have become a new "normal"...

I bought my computer chair about 15 years ago. The furniture company did not sneak into my house and smash it because it was too old.

Unsurprising. Still completely outrageous.