Install Office 2016 OEM without Live account

I totally agree. These desperate companies are fooling already stupid investors to believe their cloud growth is the one to look at and pay multiples for their stock price. At the end of the day, they are just cannibalizing the license revenue and making it look like there is huge growth, but in this kind of money printing driven market, who cares?

MS doesn't even deserve to be at its half price. yet, the algo driven market looks at their financially engineered earnings numbers, including the subscription growth, voila, we have stock doubling in less than 5 years. 

If someone looks at their books, it is obvious that the company has no innovation, in fact they have what i call denovation (depleting innovation). I wish I didn't have to upgrade but the power of monopoly dictates how we use their software. Their tech support is pathetic and anything more than just a simple fix (which I can do myself), you have to pay up. 

Granted, google and Apple could compete harder, but they are behind the curve and god knows why they won't put more resources into building a stable, reliable office competitor, instead of stupid self-driving car. That is also because, when companies get free multiples without having to show anything for, the resources go into all kinds of places where they don't belong. 

MS has the audacity and capability to ignore any of our grievances because, they can. There is no oversight, no accountability. Best thing is to move from spreadsheet driven models to developing Python codes and use it in conjuction with Tableau. '

I can't remember appreciating and feeling value-add on any MS upgrade since Windows xp and the corresponding Office products. 

Worst is for those people, like me, who changed to Mac recently, All Office applications are filled with bugs and problems, including freezes, lack of features and on and on. 

Hope more people feel that way.

I know this is old, but I am replying as it seems like the discussion is not over.

I do following two things.

1. Manually activating by inserting the Product Key into the program file to omit Live ID verification.

>> For PCs I use internally, either for myself or for my organization, I began inserting a Product Key into one of the Office 2016 software files.  This involves inserting a product code into a file consisting Office 2016 (or 2013) and also involves modifying a line in the file to omit verification of MS account registration.

>> I do this as this is the fastest and simplest (that can even be automated) while this is also legal as long as your Product Key is valid.  You paid for a product and it is yours to use.

2. Opening an (activation use) account with email such as "ProductID_****@outlook.com" and with password same as the product key.**

>> For PCs setup for externally, I create a Live account as an online activation media. Every person I setup an Office will receive two sets of activation credentials including

(1-1) Product ID: ####-####

(1-2) Product Key: #####-#####-#####-#####-#####

and

(2-1) Activation email: ProductID_####-####@outlook.com (or hotmail.com)

(2-2) Activation email password: ProductKey_#####-#####-#####-#####-#####

>> MS account becomes inactive after 120 days (or 180 days, which I am not sure of) of non-use.  If the account is not used to activate the product and/or if the account is removed from Office for longer than the set amount of time, the user may have to create the MS account again to activate it online.

The answer is You can't, and Microsoft doesn't care.  They plan to take over the world and force everyone to 365.  It makes a ton of sense for them but unfortunately for the business consumer it sucks Ba!!$.