Windows 10 - Deeper Impressions

[Formfiller]

The invitable has finally happened:

 

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.verbraucherzentrale-bawue.de%2Fabmahnung-microsoft&edit-text=

 

German consumer protection agency wants to go to court against MS because of the Windows 10 nagscreens on W7 and W8.

 

This could escalate to EU-court level yet again.

[JorgeA]

The invitable has finally happened:

 

Yup, it was bound to happen somewhere. Years ago the EU complained about MSFT pushing a mere browser, let's see now what they do about a whole OS.

 

And speaking of forced upgrades, read what is Betanews blogger Mark Wilson's probably hardest-hitting post yet on the subject:

 

Microsoft wants you to upgrade to Windows 10... whether you like it or not

 

 He's so steamed, he's resorted to some untypically rough language:

 

Microsoft managed to p*ss off a lot of people with Windows 10...

 

...Microsoft is making it harder and harder for Windows 7 and Windows 8 users to avoid Windows 10. A coerced user is not a happy user, yet Microsoft continues to force Windows 10 down people's throats in a number of ways. WT actual F?

 

You would expect that any upgrade would be optional. This seems like a reasonable assumption, but it's something that Microsoft appears to fail to understand.

 

[...]

 

With Windows 10, the company is blasting a massive 'f*ck you' to users. Your opinion doesn’t matter; you'll have Windows 10 whether you like it or not. You thought the digital age was about democracy? Think again, suckers.

 

--JorgeA 

Edited December 17, 2015 by JorgeA

[JorgeA]

A couple of months old, but in Windows Weekly 437 Paul Thurrott laid into Microsoft's failure to provide clear breakdowns of what's actually selling and what isn't in its October earnings report. The discussion starts at 50:40; Paul gets going at 51:30:

 

PT: It really bothers me how they don't report anything anymore. They'll give you little factoids about each business that has nothing to do with what we want to hear: "Surface grew by some percent or fell by some percent," but they don't tell you how many they sold, or in this case, "Bing was profitable" -- well, that's great: by how much? "Well, we're not saying that." I find that to be bad. I'm surprised that it's even allowed, frankly, but I find it to be very strange.

 

MJF: Every company hides things --

 

PT: But they're hiding everything now. In other words, you could look at any little part of the business and point out something they're hiding by virtue of the fact that they're only telling you something that looks like good news. It will be something bizarre, some little trend that has nothing to do with financials. I don't know, the way they've split up their business there's no real way to know.

 

The theme returns with Mary Jo Foley at 54:12:

 

MJF: I thought the cloud news was really interesting, really good. We don't really know how much they're making on Azure still, they don't break the numbers out that way. They talk about "the intelligent cloud," which incorporates a lot of different things, and so everybody wants to compare AWS to Azure; we don't know what that number is for Azure. We can guess, we can make some broad guesses, but like Paul said, they give you a percentage, like "Azure was up 200 percent" or whatever. 200 percent of what? We don't know.

 

[...]

 

MJF: They're also no longer reporting how many Xbox consoles are sold, they're not giving that number out anymore. I don't know if you noticed that.

 

PT: That, by the way, is the biggest problem I have with this. Seriously, "we're not going to beat PlayStation, so here's what we're gonna do: we're gonna stop talking about how many we sold!"

 

...It's sort of like in the old days (the old days meaning like, a quarter or two ago, a year ago): they would say, "In the quarter, Microsoft sold some number of Xbox consoles," but they wouldn't tell you which were 360s and which were Xbox Ones. Now we're not even getting that information.

 

At 58:04, Paul takes up the subject of cryptic Windows Updates:

 

PT: They're doing a couple of things that don't make sense to me. One is they continue to decline to identify what's in updates that they're delivering automatically to people's computers, which I find to be inexcusable. And then this stuff with the financial reporting -- it makes no sense. They clearly have designed this so that they don't have to tell the truth about what's happening with their business, which is the point of an earnings report. I find it to be dishonest.

 

Shades of 1984, where the government put out meaningless production statistics and Big Brother smiled and patted his beloved good little boys and girls on the head.

 

--JorgeA

 

 

[NoelC]

They've been sucking us into a cloud-integrated life, and have now chosen to leverage it against us in every way possible.  No half measures, nosiree.  Once "they wouldn't dare do that" is left behind, the sky (complete with clouds, some of them dark) is the limit.

 

Absolute power corrupts, absolutely.

 

It's proof that when a company crosses over the threshold to the dark side, there's no being conservative about it.  The phrase "all in and heavily armed" seems to apply.

 

-Noel

Edited December 18, 2015 by NoelC

[JorgeA]

Well put, NoelC.

 

One weapon at our disposal (indeed, probably the only one they'll respect) is to deny them revenue from sales of their software products -- er, I mean, of their "software-as-a-service" subscriptions. So for anybody considering getting Office 365, may I suggest taking advantage of SoftMaker's annual offer to donate to charity for every download of their FreeOffice suite. It's not a time-limited trial (though the donation offer is), but if you like it, you can always buy the commercial version and send your hard-earned money to these folks instead of Microsoft.

 

For those who care, it even works on Windows 10.

 

--JorgeA

[Drugwash]

[…] It's proof that when a company crosses over the threshold to the dark side […]

I like this phrasing. Looks like Microsoft are already dead but they don't know it yet. Why don't we help them cross over 'Ghost whisperer' style…?   JorgeA above has a point, for one.

[JorgeA]

Speaking of helping them cross over, see the following headline:

 

Red Hat Stock Sets 15-Year Highs On Software Sales

 

Investors doffed their caps to Red Hat (NYSE:RHT) Friday, pushing its stock to fresh 15-year highs after the company late Thursday provided Q3 earnings and sales that beat analyst expectations, as did its Q4 sales guidance.

 

Wonder if any part of this might have to do with companies on XP, Vista or 7 declining to move to Windows 8 or 10 as a result of the various issues these OSes raise.

 

--JorgeA

 

EDIT: Forgot the URL for the article. Added it.

Edited December 19, 2015 by JorgeA

[TELVM]

Microsoft customizing Windows 10 specifically for the Chinese government

[jaclaz]

 

... meanwhile in Mattel ...

http://kernelmag.dailydot.com/issue-sections/features-issue-sections/15018/hello-barbie-security-concerns/

 

The only senceful use of that thingy might be as a replacement (non-) clay target for skeet practicing.... PULL!

 

jaclaz

Still OT, but somehow related and JFYI:

http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/11/when-children-are-breached-inside-the-massive-vtech-hack/

 

Continuing the OT, today it's Hello Kitty:

http://news.softpedia.com/news/data-breach-on-hello-kitty-servers-over-3-3-million-accounts-exposed-497872.shtml

 

jaclaz

[NoelC]

How is proof that data breaches occur in the real world OT (off topic)?

 

To me it seems absolutely ON topic, in that those who would have us blithely send all our personal data to cloud servers want us to believe it could never happen.

 

-Noel

[jaclaz]

How is proof that data breaches occur in the real world OT (off topic)?

Well, it is off topic in the sense that it is not specifically referred to the Abomination (Windows 10 for the readers that are not part of the club).

To me it seems absolutely ON topic, in that those who would have us blithely send all our personal data to cloud servers want us to believe it could never happen.

And yes, it is on topic, in the sense that even if you have done everything in your power to tame the Abomination, it is a good thing that you know how it is only a part of the issues, your daughter or nephew may actually be more exposed than you are through something that you wouldn't even consider dangerous (a child's toy).

Why in my day the top technology were talking dolls, and you had to pull a string to have 'em talk, no fancy batteries, No Sir ...

... and we LIKED it!

https://tinyapps.org/blog/misc/200702250700_why_in_my_day.html

jaclaz

[NoelC]

New FUD being spread:  The dreaded Drive-By-Download attack!

 

SmartScreen Filter in Internet Explorer will now stop Drive-By-Downloads

 

Bottom line:  Make SURE you have Windows 10 and allow full privacy-invading cloud access because if you don't use the wonderful SmartScreen Filter you could be attacked!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

-Noel

[JorgeA]

^^ While the above is a welcome development, it seems to me that the danger is highly exaggerated. Modern AV suites have evolved to identify and stop these sorts of attacks by their behavior, instead of relying merely on long lists of malware definitions. There is also independent "anti-exploit" software like EMET, HitmanPro.Alert, and MBAE that will run on top of your AV.

 

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

Microsoft customizing Windows 10 specifically for the Chinese government

 

The linked article says:

 

Microsoft has lost brand image in the country due to consumer fears of Windows 10’s privacy settings. Customers from other parts of the world have been having the same fears, but the Chinese have taken it more to heart, and Microsoft is hurting because of it.

 

Somehow I doubt that the Chinese government, of all things, would be concerned about protecting the privacy of the people it rules. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the way MSFT cozied up to Beijing was by pledging to forward to the government everything that it learns about individual Chinese users of Windows 10.

 

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

'Get Windows 10' prompt adopts malware-like tactics to lure you into upgrading

 

Microsoft takes the gloves off, pushes Windows 10 upgrades even harder

 

 

Once a small box begging for a reservation in the corner of the screen, the “Get Windows 10” pop-up prompt has morphed to consume the majority of the display, and worse, it only presents users with two clear actionable buttons: Upgrade now, and Start download, upgrade later. There’s no immediate “No thanks” option whatsoever.

 

To be fair, you can still simply close the window using the X in the upper-right corner, and if you click through the itty-bitty inconspicuous chevron on the right-edge of the window there may be a “Nope” prompt somewhere further down the line. (I closed the prompt before exploring the auxiliary pages.) But having the only two large, clearly actionable options on a pop-up page both lead to a Windows 10 download feels inherently icky—like Microsoft’s trying to trick less-savvy computer users into downloading the operating system with tactics often used by spammers and malicious websites.

 

 

Now it’s true that the close box in the upper-right corner is still available to click, and users therefore still have the technical option to opt out, but this type of system is what’s known as a “dark pattern.” A dark pattern is a user interface design that’s deliberately intended to trick the user into making a particular choice.

 

Which leads us to the next link, a highly informative discussion of dirty cybertricks:

 

Dark Patterns: inside the interfaces designed to trick you

 

A dark pattern is a user interface carefully crafted to trick users into doing things they might not otherwise do, such as buying insurance with their purchase or signing up for recurring bills. Normally when you think of “bad design,” you think of the creator as being sloppy or lazy — but without ill intent. Dark patterns, on the other hand, are not mistakes. They're carefully crafted with a solid understanding of human psychology, and they do not have the user’s interests in mind.

 

[...]

 

The thing to take away here is to realize that although it’s easy to play these tricks, they will p*** off your users. It’s quite useful to think of your brand’s relationship with your users in human terms.

 

[...]

 

Experts Exchange could still be a dominant force today, but they’re not. They got greedy, they used dark patterns, and everyone got annoyed with them and migrated to a friendlier, more ethical competitor.

 

When you look at your customers in aggregate, it’s easy to be very detached and impersonal about it. To understand the reality of what it’s like to be on the receiving end of your product, you have to zoom in.

 

--JorgeA