I'd say qwerty_smith has it about right and really as a consultant you must care about your clients systems. As for fault place it if it's a Win sys where it lays M$ like due to the 167 patches issued in 2001 and the recent patches relating directly to security issues we would like to assure your network what XP has one just to comply with Anitrust. Liability as a consultant is you do fixes as you are called questions is and you know the answer your client does not spend 2 hours each day learning on what patches M$ Wins needs now do they. Black mail is when M$ wants me to pay for a privalge to upgrade even though at best company contract spell out Office 2000 and PDF at best. Do your clients a favor and let them baulk at M$ new privladege payed in advance terms..tell them how short M$ leaves them and their total cost..M$ has to now live up to being the standard and well we all need time more like 6 years between upgrades, I am not my company not assured of their marketing fluff of Software Assurance Agreement"..pay to get secure not upgrade this is better, is why I was hired I put it in reality terms my company clients drive my upgrade not M$.