Multiple Subscriptions

One of the big changes in our upcoming revision to the MSDN Subscriber Downloads program is that we'll start to support multiple subscriptions on a single Passport.  Going forward, you'll be able to see all of your subscriptions from the same login, and select the benefit that you'd like to actually use (for downloads, product keys, whatever).  A question that I have for anyone who would care to comment is:  How likely are you to ever have more than one active subscription at a time, and how many subscriptions should a single Passport support?  Leave some comments and let me know...

Comments

• Anonymous
  May 27, 2005
  Well I know I could have two subscriptions on mine. If this is along the lines you are thinking. First off as a developer I have a universal subscription I use probably 99% of the time. However the company has a select agreement for our normal software. So why I would use that is because when I go to set up another web server or another biuztalk server or somethign like that I wouldn't use my developer licenses just my select agreement. Also, there is something wierd with the 2003 installs I am sure by design. One time I couldn't find the server 2003 CD from our enterprise license so I just used my MSDN Universal software, figured I could just use the key for the enterprise agreeement, well that wasn't the case so Then I had to have the person in charge of the select log in download the image then I burned it then installed it then when I went to bring it back one of our operations admins had returned from the datacenter with the real cd. So this would be nice to have in this scenario.
• Anonymous
  May 29, 2005
  First, this site now requires you to register and login, so those who aren't aware of why you can't post comments go to https://blogs.msdn.com/ and register and login. Frustrating and annoying that links are not obvious right in the MSDNSubscription Weblog. Perhaps this is my first comment. MAKE IT EASIER TO COMMENT.
  
  The second comment, and more to the core of the discussion is this may be possible for companies with multiple subscriptions, but the person who controls those subscriptions is likely to be a petty powergrubbing little tyrant, and unlikely to hand out download information to his "inferiors". So the scenario of a company letting its developers use the company's download account regardless of whether or not the developer has a personal account seems MIGHTY unlikely (worse, if it did happen and the company fired the employee, MS could reasonably expect a flood of requests from employeers to revoke download permissions).
  
  As for the likelihood of a single developer having multiple subscriptions, well, that seems VERY unlikely to me, it is hard enough to afford ONE subscription without needlessly paying for a second subscription for a single individual. (if you can afford 2 subscriptions, you can probably afford the top end one, so why waste money with another equal or lower level subscription ??)
  
  Yes, there are a few even more specialized cases, but again they result in the same cost/twisted politics problems, but only greatly magnified.
  
  Ultimately, I can't see any reasonably likely situation where this would actually be needed. Keep it simple, One passport per subscription.
• Anonymous
  May 30, 2005
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 30, 2005
  I have an Universal subcription, and I also manage my company's Microsoft Certified Partner benifits (including MSDN). I would love to have sigle login for managing both accounts.
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2005
  Well sounds like a mighty fine idea to me!
  
  We have a group of comapanies who we part or wholly own and each of these has different needs and subscriptions. I also have my own company with my own subscriptions and it can be a bit tiresome when navigating and suddenly the company association is lost or the company changes.
  
  Powergrubbing tyrant - no. Wanting to ensure license compliance across a group of companies, yes!
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2005
  Please....supporting multiple subscription would be awesome and alleviate a big headache for me. I manage multiple contract developers who each have subscriptions assigned to them but I hold the download access. Also, my company buys msdn universals for each of our dev and test servers. for my team, right now I have about a two dozen passports linked with subscriptions. this would make life much easier for me!
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2005
  This is a wonderful idea. I am a consultant and have logins for multiple subscriptions based upon contract I am working for. This would allow easier management (service levels and product keys) for all projects!
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2005
  J-G, yes, you are in that small group of people I mentioned with special cases.
  
  I think the idea of someone owning multiple companies, all of which own msdn subscriptions AND that same someone managing the subscriptions for all those companies probably puts you in a minority of one.
  
  If you choose to let someone from company A access the downloads site which also grants them the rights of company B (assuming they have different license types) - definite room for license confusion, even possible violations.
  
  I shudder to think of the nightmare if you sold your rights in one of those companies and all the logins are on one single passport.
  
  No, I stand by my position that this simply, needlessly muddies the waters and adds unwarrented complexity for too little return for too few people.
• Anonymous
  June 01, 2005
  Thanks for the feedback, everyone. I agree that the comment experience is pretty grim - I didn't see that this change had gone into effect but I'll look into it.
• Anonymous
  June 02, 2005
  I would like to be able to control all of our MSDN subscriptions from my passport. So that would be 10 subscriptions now, but more in the future as we add more developers.
• Anonymous
  June 16, 2005
  Well, we have 4 subscriptions on our campus and may add a couple more. It would be nice to handle them all under one passport.