
Is Microsoft boiling the users to death, by not boiling the experts? - Zyst
http://zyst.io/is-microsoft-boiling-us-to-death
======
jimrandomh
I think this is a failure of internal management on Microsoft's part. There
aren't ads in the file manager because Microsoft-as-a-whole decided they
should be there; there are ads in the file manager because the OneDrive team
wanted more users, didn't care about alienating people from Windows-in-
general, and had the power to put ads there.

~~~
yebyen
Wow. Put ads there!

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daly
I bought a new computer with Windows 10 for my wife, an artist. It contains
Windows Home edition.

Windows Update reboots her computer "outside of working hours". Of course, she
leaves the computer running with partially completed work sitting in the
application because art isn't something you do in one sitting. She comes back
on occasion and finds that Microsoft rebooted the computer, LOSING ALL HER
WORK.

This shows that Microsoft does not value its users and their work.

I could, of course, BUY an "upgraded, professional version" but I have a
better solution.

I'm about to reformat the machine into Linux.

~~~
novia
For those who may be interested: the way to turn this particular trait off in
Windows 10 is to mark all of your Internet connections as "metered
connections." Windows will no longer download updates unless you specifically
ask for them, which you can do when you're not in the middle of a big project.

~~~
blibble
this loophole is being "fixed", windows will soon download "essential" updates
automatically over metered connections regardless

[http://www.techradar.com/news/windows-10-could-start-
pushing...](http://www.techradar.com/news/windows-10-could-start-pushing-
essential-updates-over-metered-connections)

~~~
novia
perhaps that update will never get downloaded onto my machine

~~~
Silhouette
How long will you go without security updates to achieve that?

The game was over as soon as Microsoft decided not to allow some users to
install individual patches any more and to bundle security fixes with other
changes as part of the same update mechanism.

~~~
novia
Well, I did a little bit of research and it looks like the policy Microsoft
had in place was already allowing for emergency updates to be installed over
metered connections, and this change in wording may just be a clarification of
the existing policy. I'm going to hold off on updating until there is more
information out there about what the change in wording actually implies. If
things are bad enough I might change to a new OS to work on my projects.
Automatic updates are just so distracting and frustrating most of the time.
Like most humans, I just want control over my environment.

------
HenryBemis
Microsoft is getting ultra-greedy.

They missed their chance to "spy" on us as much as Google (google search,
gmail, maps, google-analytics, android) and Facebook (facebook, whatsapp,
instagram) do.

They are trying to catch-up (skype no more p2p, linkedin) and I've noticed
that XP & 7 were leaking a little, 8 was leaking moderately but 10 gets the
cake!

They want their piece of the pie, they want to enter, see everything, read
everything, snatch everything.

They went from "neutral OS minding their own business" to "your business is
our business". Something like installing XYZ app on an iPhone and see that it
"talks" to 5 trackers and facebook (for the betterment of the services).

1\. There is no such thing as a FREE meal (OS). 2\. If something is given to
you for FREE then the product is YOU.

Good luck to all of us. The discussion remains the same: whose data is our
data and if/what can we do to keep it ours.

Edit: also the tendency to use "cloud" for all Office files (which 100% are
scanned, analysed and given to any government that sneezes) is also deplorable
but hey, "clouds are cool"

~~~
m1el
> 1\. There is no such thing as a FREE meal (OS)

Windows is not free.

~~~
mjevans
The perception to end users is that it is. When was the last time you heard a
/normal/ end user even considering that Windows had a price as part of their
computer build?

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ChuckMcM
I have very mixed emotions about this. There is a bit of nuance here I think.

I have both Windows and Linux desktops, and both annoy me tremendously during
updates. On Windows its a new feature that I have to 'click to disable' and on
Linux is a new feature that completely screws up my settings and I have to
click to go back to the way it was, or construct my settings using the new
paradigm.

Both of these annoyances are driven by software change. As the software
changes, it changes the environment in which it runs, and symbiotically a
bunch of other things change. Why do these things change?

Basically capital. In the free software world it is intellectual capital. Most
people who want to contribute to open source, want to do so by "creating a new
feature" or "improving and existing feature to be better". Few people want to
contribute by "fixing compatibility bugs" or "fixing configuration confusion."
They have intellectual capital to spend and they want to spend it on change,
not on status quo. In the commercial software world it is worse, they are
constantly paying their programming team, every day, every week, 11 paid
holidays a year. They can only do that if they have revenue. And they get
revenue by selling change not by polishing the status quo. So they change
things and they get 'creative' about ways to get revenue.

The ugly truth is that the software business could in fact be "done" for a lot
of things. You could just declare the kernel "done" and only allow bug fixes
or new processor support. You can declare AutoCAD done and only fix bugs or
add GPU support. You can declare graphics Done and simply build GPUs that do
what the graphics library need, perhaps a bit faster.

The world changed in a fundamental way when computers got to be 'fast enough'
for the imagination of people who wanted to use them. Upgrade cycles started
lagging and now it is not uncommon for someone to have a computer for five
years before an upgrade. Microsoft needs to make enough money on the OS they
sold you once ever 5 years to pay for a crap ton of developers. The math
doesn't work, so they are being 'creative' about other ways to make money on
those users. Linux/FOSS needs new developers to survive but those developers
mostly want to work on 'features' not bugs. So Linux systems suffer arbitrary
feature churn.

I think the author's peeve is a _symptom_ not the problem. The problem is that
the money is leaving the software space and without it commercial software is
not viable.

~~~
pmontra
> [updates] on Linux is a new feature that completely screws up my settings
> and I have to click to go back to the way it was, or construct my settings
> using the new paradigm.

I've been using Linux as my primary desktop in the form of Ubuntu since early
2009. What settings are screwed up by up by updates? I can think about init
scripts becoming upstart and then systemd. Is it that?

I didn't notice anything else in these years unless we're regarding desktop
environments as settings (Gnome 2 to 3 or to Unity). The change of desktop
environment has been the most annoying change of the period. Luckily I managed
to keep an almost Gnome 2 experience within the Gnome 3 environment using the
Gnome fallback mode. However I wished they never spent time working on Gnome 3
and left it as it was. I have the feeling I had to work to undo all their work
which is a pity.

~~~
f4rker
Lol I always think it's so funny when​ people are like "I've been using Linux
for years, almost never a problem". The last Linux mint update completely
crashed the default desktop. I've used many distros including Ubuntu starting
back when they would mail you a CD. The problems are endless.

~~~
digi_owl
IMO all computers have problems, any claim otherwise are either delusional or
fanboys (one could argue that's two terms for the same problem, btw).

Sadly in recent years Linux has taken on more and more of a Windows like black
box experience.

What used to be clearly defined lines between parts have been blurred. And
what used to be debuggable by running the same commands manually has turned
into heisenbugs mediated over dbus.

Sad part is that while this makes me sound like an old graybeard, i am not
much older than the people that are implementing all these changes.

------
usernam
Windows has become essentially malware for most of it's users. The sad part is
that most of them don't actually care or cannot change easily because of
existing software.

But I do hope Microsoft improves WSFL to the point that I can say: just write
for linux instead, you get windows support for free [and this is already
partly true].

~~~
partiallypro
> Windows has become essentially malware for most of it's users

That's a major exaggeration. The home suite's ads are more like tooltips than
actual ads and they only appear once on a new install; every paid OS has
similar things. Chrome OS, OSX and Windows. Ubuntu has sponsored search. Most
people I know like Windows 10, it's largely a small group of people that are
in love with Windows 7, are die hard Apple fans or Linux diehards that refuse
to adopt 10 and most of them are scared of telemetry data being collected
(which as a privacy "concern" has largely been disproven by Thurrott and
others.) That being said, I hope Microsoft changes course and gets rid of most
of these items. I actually find the one time reminder to use Edge and the plug
OneDrive vastly less annoying (and more inline with their competition) and
intrusive than having to disable "promoted apps." Anyhow, calling it "malware"
is utter nonsense.

~~~
justinclift
> That's a major exaggeration.

It's an opinion shared by many. Including myself.

Personally, for my gaming box I've moved back to Win 7. When 7 _completely_
runs out of support, hopefully I've lost interest in the Windows only games.

Everything else either runs OSX (desktop), or various BSD.

------
AdmiralAsshat
I'm gonna disagree with the article and say _no_ , the "experts" will not
stay. Eventually they might get tired, as I did, with playing whack-a-mole
with W10's new forms of adware with every new update and switch to Linux. Just
because "there's a way to turn it off" doesn't mean I want to have to dig
through these steps each time some new nefarious "functionality" gets added.

~~~
empath75
The experts that still use windows are probably mostly on windows for games.
Until the games market switches to Linux, they are stuck with it.

~~~
justinclift
Unfortunately, most of the higher end CAD/CAM software is Windows only.
Solidworks, CATIA, Creo, etc.

Siemens NX is a notable exception (Win/OSX/Linux). Seems like the only one
though. :(

~~~
CyberFonic
In my experience CAD/CAM users are experienced in their speciality, e.g.
architecture, mechanical engineering, etc, but often are not very computer
literate. It's not due to a lack of intelligence, but they have better things
to do than to become IT specialists as well.

People in these fields, generally start out in larger firms and thus are only
familiar with Windows as good corporate staffers. Those that go freelance or
join startups, tend to continue using what they are already familiar with.

The CAD/CAM software vendors are motivated to go after enterprise licenses,
thus there little incentive to support anything but the most widely used
operating system.

------
wmf
I have the same feeling about the "just use a VPN" argument against net
neutrality. That sound you hear is all the normal people in the world being
thrown under the bus.

~~~
alphabettsy
I agree with what you're getting at, but I think you mean Privacy rather than
Net Neutrality.

The other commenter mentioned VPN becoming more regular which is good, but
also maybe indicates something troubling. If it's regular for people to feel
they need to take extra steps to protect their privacy from companies they're
already paying then it would seem something's wrong.

------
walterbell
_> It’s quite possible it might not have been on purpose_

The movement of Windows 7 "Professional" features into Windows 10 "Enterprise"
editions was purposeful. E.g. monthly payments are required for Enterprise.

It is not easy for individuals (professional users) to buy Win10 Enterprise
and LTSB editions. As a result, features/policies can be forced onto
individual users. Such policies would likely not be accepted by system and
security admins at businesses.

------
tedsanders
Honest question: are ads for OneDrive on Windows any worse than ads for Chrome
on Gmail? As a user, I see them as equally annoying (based purely on the
consequential effects and not the implications).

~~~
Zyst
A key difference would be that I don't pay for Gmail, thus I pay through my
data and ads. If I want a paid email solution that doesn't harvest my data, or
serves me ads such things exist.

Also, having any OS collect your data is an incredible privacy violation,
since, Operating systems, by their very nature have incredibly overarching
access to essentially everything you do. And then, on top of it all, they
serve ads.

Essentially, so far, software was either "sold", ad supported, or data
supported, or both ad and data supported. Windows is trying to triple tap.

And again, the OS has access to absolutely everything. Having a platform have
access to a slice of your life feels very different from having a platform
have access to everything.

------
digi_owl
I dunno, power-users is being looked upon with disdain across the board these
days. MS, Apple, even in the Linux word, developers will pitch their nose up
if anyone mention the term.

they all see "power-users" as something rotten. A infestation in their
perfectly pruned UX world of grazing users.

Note btw that MS is keeping these ads out of the market where their real money
is, enterprise.

To MS, private and soho sales are just a pitch point when they go to sell
their package deals of volume licensing. One about reduced costs of training
employees.

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roma1n
I had the same feeling when Ubuntu introduced sponsored search.

~~~
mirimir
That's when I quit using Ubuntu. And sure, you could turn it off ;)

~~~
jasonkostempski
I believe they took that out ASAP. It's not a great sign management made the
choice in the first place but backtracking on a bad choice these days is
actually pretty rare for a company to do and I find the action somewhat
promising.

~~~
mirimir
I don't recall that it was quite ASAP, but yes, it did get removed.

The worst aspect, though, was that they made Amazon search the default, and
provided no opportunity to opt out during installation.

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heynowletsgo
In a capitalist, caste system society this phenomenon is known as "freedom".

~~~
digi_owl
Should have sprung for that "pro" package...

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SFJulie
I have the same feeling with linux's experts and systemd.

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CyberFonic
Real computer experts do not use Microsoft products !

