You'll just be delaying moving to Dorico by a year or so. Suit yourself.

As a method of choosing which tool is best for your use, that seems less than optimal. 

And as a consumer protest, pretty pointless. 

They could have just said "We're closing it down; find something else." It's a sad day, and I know it feels like being kicked out of your home; but ultimately all software is transient.

No one is happy about this but they could have just turned off the lights like Encore, Rhapsody, MusicTime, Igor, Professional Composer/Mosaic, Deluxe Music Construction Kit and a large number of other notation apps that no longer exist.

It's only five pages and you did agree to it once:

FINALE® END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT

https://wpmedia.makemusic.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Finale-End_User_License_Agreement_v27.pdf 

And let's be real...how much was the last "major" Finale update? $100? For $25 more you get freaking DORICO! Say goodbye to cleaning up scores/formatting since Dorico will just do it for you. I could go on and on about the features, but make no mistake - you're getting the best lifeline possible for an incredible price. 

Yes to Jeff's comment. Big 'but' however is the hundreds of full concert scores that I will no longer be able to edit should the need arise. Have them pretty much all published as PDF's and will check any files that are not then publish as PDF's.

Folks have a year to export XML files as well, if they wish to be doubly safe.

Scoring Notes has an article on the change along with some suggestions for those anxious to preserve their ability to work with their music in the future.

And those who do switch to Dorico Pro will find not a few former Finale users doing advanced work in Dorico and very generous with their time on the Dorico help forum, where they are joined by members of the Dorico Development Team on a nearly daily basis.

The correct solution is to patch the software one last time to remove the requirement to authorize with a server. They're not making money on it anymore anyway. What they're doing here is just despicable.

I only recently purchased the latest version of Finale.  I was not "eligible" for upgrades due to some amount of time having elapsed.  So... I spent full price for Finale, and two months later am told in essence "spend more money if you want to keep it going...".    Look... I realize this is far from being the end of the world - there ARE alternatives - but the manner in which this was handled completely disregards users in my situation.   Not exactly a "friendly" exit.  More like "too bad... you're on your own or give us more $dough-re-mi".

Please consider one final patch to the various Finale versions in the wild that would remove the authorization requirement from the software. Computers die, and someday "the software will continue working as long as your current computer is active" is no longer a viable solution.

I am on Finale 2011, and while I don't compose on a day-to-day basis anymore, I have almost twenty years worth of files in my archives. Yes, I could convert everything to XML format, but I would prefer to be able to continue opening, playing, and printing my music in the software it was originally written in, for which I paid premium prices for over 17 years.

Thank you!

I only recently purchased the latest version of Finale.  I was not "eligible" for upgrades due to some amount of time having elapsed.

Pardon my skepticism but I believe this is the first time in eight years that we've heard that a version of Finale was too old to be upgraded. There's something you aren't telling us. 

I am on Finale 2011, and while I don't compose on a day-to-day basis anymore, I have almost twenty years worth of files in my archives. Yes, I could convert everything to XML format, but I would prefer to be able to continue opening, playing, and printing my music in the software it was originally written in, for which I paid premium prices for over 17 years.

Keep that old computer going and this won't be a problem. Get a good backup if Windows, use Time Machine if on a Mac. If you do not have the free Dolet 7 plug-in installed, go to the following link and download it now. This updates MusicXML to v. 3.1 for Finale 2011 to 2014.5. MusicXML 3.1 was introduced with 25.4 with new features and greater compatibility and this plug-in was released at that time. I downloaded Dolet v.7.6 for both Win (27.6MB) and Mac (5.6MB) just now so I know the links are good. Do it before MM changes their mind.

https://www.musicxml.com/dolet-plugin/dolet-plugin-for-finale/