When I updated my Macbook Air to Monterey, I purchased and installed Microsoft Office Home & Business 2019 (having an earlier incompatible version, 2011 I believe).

It’s been working fine, but the other day, at about the one year anniversary of the initial install, Excel refused to save my work.

I eventually figured out that I needed to log in to my Microsoft account and “activate” the program again, which happened automatically and painlessly once I’d logged in.

Is there a way around this, such as editing my /etc/hosts file so that Office cannot “phone home”?

(I find this behavior exceptionally annoying. Seems if I buy and install a program, and one that doesn’t require an annual charge, I shouldn’t be bothered with this. Imagine I hadn’t had internet access at the time, and would’ve effectively been unable to use my software. Is my attitude reasonable?)