I'll probably piss people off with this viewpoint, but, if anything, it seems kinda nice to finally give this option on the consumer side. I always thought it was weird that I could've paid to keep using XP for longer if I was an enterprise, but, because I was an individual, I just had to upgrade if I wanted to keep using Windows with current security patches.

And, yes, paying for patches sucks, but it's the standard practice, even in the world of Linux. In fact, for Ubuntu, you need to start paying after 5 years (for max 10 years of support). Microsoft gave everyone 10 years and you can pay to have more than 10.

So it's even better than before?

There's no reason for anyone but the non-tech savvy to care about this. Just like every time before it'll be a simple registry tweak to make Windows Update pull from the extended support channel.

Now there's an alternative if you want to do it officially or aren't as tech savvy. Don't see this as anything but a win, despite the way the article is framing it.