Microsoft is charging higher license costs for Windows server on competing cloud providers (but not all competing providers) than on Azure.
For the exact same software.
This isn’t an axe to grind with Microsoft, it’s clearly anti competitive.
> A vendor dictating what hardware you can run it on is expected.
Correct, Microsoft is literally dictating what hardware you can run it on, and what it costs to run it on that hardware. Which has been happening for decades. Either you've never dealt with enterprise software, or you're refusing to acknowledge reality. Oracle has been doing this from the beginning of time, they charge a different "per core" price depending on the type of core you choose, to promote the sale of their own hardware.
They extended the same pricing model to cloud. The only reason you're complaining about this is because it's Microsoft.
https://www.oracle.com/contracts/docs/processor-core-factor-...
https://medium.com/@vbalebai/debunking-the-myth-oracle-in-th...