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Windows 8 - Deeper Impressions


JorgeA

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Seventh comment on the link you provided is quite amusing

Windopia: A condition of acute technological nearsightedness resulting from a person's sole acquaintance to computing being through Microsoft Windows. Often accompanied by magical thinking regarding all products and pitches the company offers.

Microsoft Pulls the Plug on "Scroogled" Ads

I don't know how accurate it is, just thought I'd report it and contribute something to this thread I read and support. :thumbup

GL

Thanks very much for the link! And of course for contributing...

Maybe Google offered to give Microsoft the same kind of treatment, based on the latter's own privacy record as we've seen in this thread.

--JorgeA

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In fairness to Walt, he gave a straight review upon release:

Walt Mossberg Reviews Windows 8

I think he initially advocated on the assumption that Microsoft knew what it was doing then later backpedaled once he realized how backwards it was. Maybe he assumed that the bugs would have been ironed out by release.

Yeah, I think that a lot of people underestimated the degree of bull-headed "see no evil, hear no evil" incompetence that a certain newly-styled "devices and services" company has displayed with respect to Windows 8. More and more in the tech press seem to be coming around. Read (or listen to) this exchange between host Leo Laporte (founder of This Week in Tech) and security specialist Steve Gibson in a recent "Security Now!" podcast. It starts at about 44:15:

SG: So, for people who care -- and our listeners know how I feel about Windows 8 -- the Windows 8 Pro special $40 upgrade offer ends on February 1, and then it goes up to $199. So --

LL: I bet it doesn't. <laughter> My prediction! Just gonna make a prediction.

SG: Well, OK, it is -- at the Windows blog, there's the link there --

LL: No, they say it ends, I'm just saying, let's see what happens then. 'cause nobody's buying this piece of crap. <laughter>

...

LL: Nobody's buying Windows 8 and making it $200 is not gonna help it sell any better.

...

LL: You know, the more I use it -- I've been reviewing Windows 8 laptops -- the more I use it, the more I wonder what the hell they were thinking.

SG: I know.

LL: It is awful!

The specific prediction didn't come true, but Leo's larger point about Win8 sales is still bearing out.

--JorgeA

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The specific prediction didn't come true, but Leo's larger point about Win8 sales is still bearing out
.

Actually , the prediction was right.

There are plenty of copies of 8 at the promo price or less still available - even now - on Amazon UK and elsewhere. Clearly they still can't shift it even at that price.

Windows 8 Pro, Upgrade Edition [upgrade from Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7] (PC): Amazon.co.uk: Software

Now MS UK has dropped their Pro price back to the promo price again.To be fair - it is just above the promo price ( 4.99 more including media ). I expect that is because they do not want to undercut the poor retailers who are stiil trying to shift the inventory they already bought .

Windows 8 Pro price slashed to £45 | News | PC Pro

In fairness to Walt, he gave a straight review upon release:

Walt Mossberg Reviews Windows 8

I think he initially advocated on the assumption that Microsoft knew what it was doing then later backpedaled once he realized how backwards it was. Maybe he assumed that the bugs would have been ironed out by release.

Yeah, I think that a lot of people underestimated the degree of bull-headed "see no evil, hear no evil" incompetence that a certain newly-styled "devices and services" company has displayed with respect to Windows 8. More and more in the tech press seem to be coming around. Read (or listen to) this exchange between host Leo Laporte (founder of This Week in Tech) and security specialist Steve Gibson in a recent "Security Now!" podcast. It starts at about 44:15:

SG: So, for people who care -- and our listeners know how I feel about Windows 8 -- the Windows 8 Pro special $40 upgrade offer ends on February 1, and then it goes up to $199. So --

LL: I bet it doesn't. <laughter> My prediction! Just gonna make a prediction.

SG: Well, OK, it is -- at the Windows blog, there's the link there --

LL: No, they say it ends, I'm just saying, let's see what happens then. 'cause nobody's buying this piece of crap. <laughter>

...

LL: Nobody's buying Windows 8 and making it $200 is not gonna help it sell any better.

...

LL: You know, the more I use it -- I've been reviewing Windows 8 laptops -- the more I use it, the more I wonder what the hell they were thinking.

SG: I know.

LL: It is awful!

The specific prediction didn't come true, but Leo's larger point about Win8 sales is still bearing out.

--JorgeA

Edited by SIW2
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Leo wasn't on board from the start. He reviewed 8 a few days after the BUILD Conference preview release, was immediately skeptical, and said all the stuff "we" were saying since then as well:

Another thing he was wrong about was at 7:23 where he says that Microsoft will just have to provide a "great big button" to turn off Metro and turn on the Windows 7 interface. Like most of us, he just couldn't believe Microsoft would foist something like this on its customer base.

His dress style hasn't changed one bit in over 15 years. In fact, I think that's actually the exact same shirt.

EDIT: pay attention to him playing chess. He clearly clicks on one pawn only to have the one next to it move.

Edited by HalloweenDocument12
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The specific prediction didn't come true, but Leo's larger point about Win8 sales is still bearing out
.

Actually , the prediction was right.

There are plenty of copies of 8 at the promo price or less still available - even now - on Amazon UK and elsewhere. Clearly they still can't shift it even at that price.

Windows 8 Pro, Upgrade Edition [upgrade from Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7] (PC): Amazon.co.uk: Software

Now MS UK has dropped their Pro price back to the promo price again.To be fair - it is just above the promo price ( 4.99 more including media ). I expect that is because they do not want to undercut the poor retailers who are stiil trying to shift the inventory they already bought .

Windows 8 Pro price slashed to £45 | News | PC Pro

Wow, that's remarkable. Just waiting for the tech press on this side of the pond to pick up on what's going on with Win8 sales in the UK.

--JorgeA

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Leo wasn't on board from the start. He reviewed 8 a few days after the BUILD Conference preview release, was immediately skeptical, and said all the stuff "we" were saying since then as well:

Another thing he was wrong about was at 7:23 where he says that Microsoft will just have to provide a "great big button" to turn off Metro and turn on the Windows 7 interface. Like most of us, he just couldn't believe Microsoft would foist something like this on its customer base.

I (think I) remember Leo reacting sympathetically to a number of fanboyish things that Paul Thurrott has said about Windows 8 in another Leo podcast, "Windows Weekly." Maybe he was just playing the role of genial host? Or maybe he was keeping neutral and I interpreted it as sympathy.

His dress style hasn't changed one bit in over 15 years. In fact, I think that's actually the exact same shirt.

:D

EDIT: pay attention to him playing chess. He clearly clicks on one pawn only to have the one next to it move.

Will do!

--JorgeA

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EDIT: pay attention to him playing chess. He clearly clicks on one pawn only to have the one next to it move.

Will do!

Ahh, call off the dogs. The first time I watched it I thought (and so did he) that he was controlling both sides when, in fact, he had a CPU opponent. The timing of his clicking coincided with his CPU opponent acting. He isn't targeting during the 2nd CPU move when the queen takes the pawn, which...is probably just as bad as moving the wrong pawn by a supposed mis-click...

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Don't take my word for it, they fooled the WSJ among others:

Permission to Procrastinate: Wait to Get a New Laptop

It's easy to say "No one listens to Mossberg" but I actually had to put up a fight over deploying Windows 7 due to his articles. I've made sure to rub it in now that my boss knows 8 is a dog.

Well, I would "assolve" Mr. Mossberg on this.

Basically if you have available the XP source code (possibly merging in it the "embedded" version, which has some - sometimes MUCH better - features) and you attempt to better it (without intervention from the marketing department and kicking HARD a few a**es around) you would get an almost "perfect" OS.

If you add to it a whole number of senseless features, a completely unneeded set of new subsystems, NOT adequately tested/experimented, you get Vista :ph34r:.

If you learn by experience, refine the thingy, fix the most evident bugs, you have a Vista SP1 (which after all is not that bad - I cannot believe I am writing this) and if you go a bit ahead you will get a Vista SP2.

Then comes the marketing department that starts calling the above "Windows 7" ;) but the OS you have, while FAR from being perfect, is however a not-that-bad results, and you can later issue a Windows 7 SP1 (please read as Vista SP3 :angel ).

Now, if you add to it some nice features, increase compatibility, and §@ç#ing leave the interface "as is" you would get a better OS, Vista SP4 (which the marketing department will insist on calling "Windows 8" and promote as a "brand new OS, a complete revolution, a quantum leap, etc., etc.).

BUT the thingy is essentially a (revised) Vista :w00t: .

You cannot really convince people that it is something new, let alone "revolutionary".

So you add a completely new interface that besides being ugly, is also non-productive on at least 2/3 to 3/4 of the hardware on which people will expect it to run.

Of course in the remaining 1/3 to 1/4 new, mindboggingly powerful and almost, but not quite, UNlike serviceable hardware the new interface, besides being "new" may also work, but if you are a technical journalist and write in April about a product that will be delivered at the end of October you may be tricked by the marketing people describing the half-@§§ed mish-mash as the second best thing in the world after ice cream was invented.

Seriously, if you could de-componentize Windows 8, removing the senseless interface and much of the fluff, it would be easy to get a "sound" Vista SP4, there would be nothing that you would be able to call "revolutionary", you would have an "evolution" of a previous product (a rather "solid" one with a few useful missing features added) and the mentioned 2/3 to 3/4 users would be happy about it.

If you prefer, a 9 year old kid would have done that, issue being that the OS was put in the hands of 5 or 6 years old children, instead. :lol:

jaclaz

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Microsoft Pulls the Plug on "Scroogled" Ads

I don't know how accurate it is, just thought I'd report it and contribute something to this thread I read and support. :thumbup

GL

The line I loved in that article was this one by Microsoft Senior Online Services Director Stefan Weitz:

He effectively admits, though, that the campaign did not have a major impact, commenting that using Google search is "a habit... it's like smoking. It's hard to get folks to stop doing it."

As was noted in the article:

Ultimately extremely negative advertising campaigns -- including Scroogle can be effective (see "Get a Mac"), but also have the tendency to backfire.

Cheers and Regards

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Charlotte, it seems to me that you are the one that is "making trouble where there was none". Ever since the original posts that threatened the closure of the thread your posts have become more and more inflammatory in nature. Are you trying to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt?

How am I supposed to even respond to this without violating every one of the forum rules? You just said I was somehow "making trouble where there was none". For real? When I I wasn't even here? ! ! !

I think I just visited crazy land. :blink:

P.S. Your description of what has been considered on-topic in this "Deeper Impressions" thread does not correlate with what I was involved in for the last 1,500 posts or so. To make it real simple, how about someone "in the know" just spelling out what the new rules are? Specifically, what is now considered on-topic. That's not too much to ask. I would like to know what caused the previous problem. But that is clearly too much too ask.

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Microsoft Pulls the Plug on "Scroogled" Ads

I don't know how accurate it is, just thought I'd report it and contribute something to this thread I read and support. :thumbup

GL

Thanks very much for the link! And of course for contributing...

Maybe Google offered to give Microsoft the same kind of treatment, based on the latter's own privacy record as we've seen in this thread.

--JorgeA

I'm not sure how successful this ad campaign was. Outside of reading about it on various tech sites (including here), I have yet to actually see or hear one of these ads, be it on television, radio or on a website. :unsure:

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I guess that we could raise an issue about CharlotteTheHarlot that should really change the nick to CharlotteLaPutaine :whistle:

:lol:

@Charlotte

Owww, come on :), this is not crazy land, for no apparent reason, meanwhile ....

meanwhile-meanwhile-bipolar-bookstore-weird-wtf-demotivational-posters-1360746715.jpg

jaclaz

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The specific prediction didn't come true, but Leo's larger point about Win8 sales is still bearing out
.

Actually , the prediction was right.

There are plenty of copies of 8 at the promo price or less still available - even now - on Amazon UK and elsewhere. Clearly they still can't shift it even at that price.

Windows 8 Pro, Upgrade Edition [upgrade from Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7] (PC): Amazon.co.uk: Software

Now MS UK has dropped their Pro price back to the promo price again.To be fair - it is just above the promo price ( 4.99 more including media ). I expect that is because they do not want to undercut the poor retailers who are stiil trying to shift the inventory they already bought .

Windows 8 Pro price slashed to £45 | News | PC Pro

Wow, that's remarkable. Just waiting for the tech press on this side of the pond to pick up on what's going on with Win8 sales in the UK.

--JorgeA

The prices are like that across all of Europe. See:

Amazon Germany:

http://www.amazon.de/Windows-Pro-Upgrade-32-Bit/dp/B008PAGYRU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1362496995&sr=8-1

France:

http://www.amazon.fr/Windows-Professionnel-mise-depuis-Vista/dp/B008O2RI1A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1362496990&sr=8-1

Italy:

http://www.amazon.it/Windows-Upgrade-Edition-64-bit-Italiano/dp/B008ZZHP50/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1362496983&sr=8-1

All around 50€.

The Microsoft stores price is at 200 bucks in most countries, but pretty much all third party shops have W8 still at the promo pricing.

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All around 50€.

The Microsoft stores price is at 200 bucks in most countries, but pretty much all third party shops have W8 still at the promo pricing.

Sounds like the real world has a grasp of the true value of the product.

Last I knew, Redmond was in Washington State. If my memory serves me correctly, Washington legalized Mary juina the last election. Could it be that the folks in Redmond really jumped on the band wagon and are having laced brownies and smelly smoke breaks? It's the only reason I can come up with for their attitudes and moves of late.

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Go ahead, get yourself that 32GB Windows RT device and put your whole life in the Cloud: :whistle:

Add to Hacked List: Listmaking Company Evernote

Evernote said it had found no evidence content or payments information was accessed, changed or lost, but that the hackers were “able to gain access to Evernote user information, which includes usernames, email addresses associated with Evernote accounts and encrypted passwords.”

--JorgeA

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