Windows 10 - Deeper Impressions

[Tripredacus]

Well good thing MS didn't do a "Show us the great things you did" social campaign for Windows 10. I would just submit a pic of my blocked updates.

[jaclaz]

Innit interesting how of all the tweets put out by Gabe during the insider program- not one mentions bolting all this new telemetry gathering.

Well, now you are being too suspicious, simply the list of all the settings, services, outbound communications, data gathering servers and what not do not fit in 140 (actually 140,000) characters.

Privacy may be at the heart of the issue for some, but I even question the purpose of this gathering. Does it help M$ to know that "Hey, telemetry shows that a certain app or program has been installed/run a bilion times- maybe we should buy them out or block them if they are competition"?

Yep, the issue is not only about privacy (in the sense of exposing to them "sensible" data) it is also about data gathering even those data that is not reasonable (or legally allowed) to hide and the use that will be made of these data.

I will give you a completely different example, you are of course not allowed to drive a car without a license plate, the numbers/letters on it is not obviously covered by privacy, it is a state/nation issued ID for your vehicle that is meant to be visible publicly at all times.

Now, your local police department uses one of those scanners that while the patrol car travels identifies, scans and records the license plates of parked or passing cars:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition

This is very good to check for stolen vehicles and similar, but it is misused.

In theory (in a perfect world) it is an assistance to the work the police officer normally does, the thingy should read a number plate, compare it against a database of stolen vehicles, missing or wanted people cars, etc. and then the sheer moment the license plate comes out as "clean" the "system" should completely "forget" about it.

What happens is instead that the data goes anyway in a database that is kept accessible for a given period of time.

You (your car) has been pinpointed at a given time in a given place.

This piece of data "exists" and "someone" can access it.

Now, if you live in Oakland, CA. you may be lucky :

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/08/cops-decide-to-collect-less-license-plate-data-after-80gb-drive-got-full/

but if the same kind of data goes into the hands of a private company that has the resources and technology to store the data indefinitely, to correlate it countrywide and analyze it, deriving from the "big data" any kind of relevant (technically or commercially valuable) info.

Good things may come out of the data, as an example in a future where electric (battery powered) cars will be more widely used one could find the best spots where to place public recharge stations, maximizing their use and creating with the minimum investment an optimized network (that will prompt more people to buy electric cars as they will become more convenient).

Would (say) Tesla be interested in having those data?

But the same data could be used to identify all citizens that drive daily on average less than 100 Km, then another electric car manufacturer may decide to go for a new "short range vehicle", let's say with max 150 Km operating range and (still say) provide a "bigger car rent" service at a discounted price for when you want to go outside town.

If you belong to the "100 Km daily" club, you will be bombarded by advertisements from BOTH the "new" product and for the "old" long range car.

Now since all in all it is not a bad idea, you decide to subscribe to the new ECAAS (Electric Car As A Service) that will have a small written clause that allows them to collect data about your driving habits.

Since you stop every morning in a given place to get a coffee but for the vast majority of other users of the new car that place is inconvenient, a new (national chain) coffee shop will be opened where the flux is maximized (casually in a place that is very inconvenient to you) and the coffee shop you used to stop by every morning in the last few years will have to close down.

So, you will soon be driving a terrible car and be drinking awfully tasting coffee, without any actual breaking of your privacy.

The good news being that all other people around you will be driving the same car and drink the same coffee.

jaclaz

[JorgeA]

A Paul Thurrott stunner:

 

"Windows Phone has failed."

 

In episode 266 of What the Tech, Paul and Andrew Zarian are discussing the fate of Windows Phone in the wake of Microsoft's announcement of a multibillion-dollar writedown from the Nokia acquisition.

 

The discussion starts a few minutes before, but at just about the 38-minute mark, Paul states flatly:

 

Windows Phone has failed. Period. There is no, "well, we'll see what happens" -- it's failed. It's over. They will keep making them, but they're not -- this is not the focus.

 

The subject takes up most of the rest of the episode. Well worth listening to.

 

--JorgeA

 

[Formfiller]

Well, sometimes even shilling and brute-forcing isn't enough.

[NoelC]

It's good to know that the real world still rewards companies for things that provide value, and that it's not turned into "The Devil Wears Prada" out there.

 

Tech is not fashion, fashion has no place in tech.

 

-Noel

[vinifera]

dunno about winblows phone 10

but i used the one with "8", and I can say I like Android ones more !

[JorgeA]

Score another one for human ingenuity...

 

Microsoft's discontinued Media Center suite can now unofficially be installed on Windows 10

 

...Just make sure not to fall for human ingenuousness -- AV-scan the h3!! out of that file if you do decide to download it.

 

It will be interesting to see how MSFT reacts to this development, if at all, over the next few days/weeks.

 

--JorgeA

 

 

[JorgeA]

dunno about winblows phone 10

but i used the one with "8", and I can say I like Android ones more !

 

+1

 

I use an Android phone too. I've seen Windows Phones at the store and the screens look every bit as garish as the Windows 8 Start Screen.

 

--JorgeA

[jaclaz]

The reason why any (non-demented) kid 12-18 will attempt to install Linux on the family PC^[1]:
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/windows-10-automatically-sends-parents-detailed-dossier-of-their-childrens-internet-history-and-computer-use-10472226.html
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows-10/monitor-child-device-activity

jaclaz


^[1] if he/she does not own a personal PC/tablet  of course and whether he/she will succeed at it or botch the install is an altogether different thing

[Mcinwwl]

You overestimate ppl, how many parents do check internet history when they share PC with they kids

[jaclaz]

You overestimate ppl, how many parents do check internet history when they share PC with they kids

Well, but the same not-demented kids will anyway clear internet history, what the nice MS guys do now is to send to the parent's account an e-mail "regularly" summing up latest activities of the kid. (the difference between been active/proactive and passive is relevant)

 

There was (in my times) the long standing question whether parents should be allowed (in the sense whether it was opportune or not)  to read their children's diaries or not, and/or to browse in their (locked) chest/drawer (or whatever) or if the kids had some right to some limited forms of privacy/secrecy, but noone ever offered to the nosy parents incapable of opening a tiny padlock without leaving traces a service in which once every two weeks a certified burglar would come to your house, open the padlock, read the diary and provide a neatly laid sum up of events of note .

 

jaclaz

[Formfiller]

MS slowly killing off the Lumias:

 

http://lumiaconversations.microsoft.com/2015/09/04/streamlining-the-photo-experience-in-windows/

 

Lots of pissed off comments from metrotards.

[Formfiller]

Fresh metrotard on Channel9:

 

https://channel9.msdn.com/Forums/Coffeehouse/Im-not-happy-with-Windows-10-details-inside-am-I-missing-something/ff46b14e0f28429cab6fa4ef00452528

 

Isn't it weird how they all sound alike?

[jaclaz]

 

Fresh metrotard on Channel9:

 

I wouldn't define "1 month old" as "fresh".

 

jaclaz

[JorgeA]

The reason why any (non-demented) kid 12-18 will attempt to install Linux on the family PC^[1]:

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/windows-10-automatically-sends-parents-detailed-dossier-of-their-childrens-internet-history-and-computer-use-10472226.html

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows-10/monitor-child-device-activity

 

 

This led me to the following headline (that I of course could not pass up ):

 

Windows 10: man updates PC, wakes up to find porn slideshow on repeat

 

One new user of Windows 10 found an especially unwelcome surprise after upgrading to Microsoft’s new operating system — a slideshow on his desktop that was showing pornographic images that he’d saved to his computer, on repeat.

 

[...]

 

Windows 10 — which was released this week — brings with it the same live tiles that were seen in Windows 8, and on Windows Phone. One of those is called Photos, and has a corresponding app, both of which pull through images from the My Pictures folder and show them on a loop.

 

Now the thing I don't understand is how this Photos app tile managed to get itself displayed constantly and automatically. In Windows 10, the tiles are visible only when you launch the Start Menu. I thought maybe they were talking about the desktop slideshow, but the article clearly references tiles and the Photos app, and not the wallpaper. Something doesn't quite jibe here.

 

Maybe what they call the "computer" in the article is actually a Surface?

 

--JorgeA