
Microsoft criticized for changing the pop-up box encouraging users to upgrade - fredley
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36367221
======
Ambroos
I get that Microsoft wants to get people to upgrade, but forcing it like this
is just plain rude

Reality is, there are still driver issues on older hardware (especially
laptops) with Windows 10. Some of my friends get random hangs since upgrading.
My grandma's sister had her laptop upgraded and can't find anything anymore.

It's a huge download and a huge change in how your computer works. This is not
something you should just force on your users by tricking them to install it.
Nudges and prompts are fine by me. Pushing it as an opt-out thing you have to
actively cancel is just awful.

~~~
mkohlmyr
My girlfriend's laptop touchpad died upon update. After stopping her panic I
had to enable using arrow keys for the cursor movement (getting to this menu
without using said cursor was interesting..) and then roll back the "upgrade"
using arrow keys.

~~~
Eric_WVGG
Microsoft gets a lot of flack for these breaking updates, but I wonder why
more criticism isn't directed at manufacturers who pack laptops full of
obscure and poorly-written drivers.

~~~
bruceboughton
Because, like Google with Android, Microsoft enable this behaviour. They
deserve to take the flak.

------
rossng
I have already spent several hours this week on the university student IT
helpdesk fixing laptops broken by this Windows 10 update.

Every single person said they hadn't chosen to update - clearly it was a
result of this popup. Most of the failures were broken drivers that prevented
Windows from even booting. It particularly annoys me that Windows 10 tries to
install itself on completely incompatible hardware.

A nasty dark pattern.

------
Grue3
>Clicking the red cross on the right hand corner of the pop-up box now
activates the upgrade instead of closing the box.

This is just laughably evil. You can just imagine the Microsoft CEO sitting on
his throne and chuckling like a supervillain.

~~~
mobiuscog
It's also completely wrong.

The red X simply closes the notification - nothing more. Like pretty much
every notification ever.

The dialog is telling the user _something will happen_ rather than asking them
to make a choice.

Unfortunately, users largely don't pay any attention to what they're doing...

~~~
hendersoon
While that is true, you're missing that this is a change from how the upgrade
dialogue worked for the past several months.

In the past, it popped up a window asking when you want to schedule the
upgrade, and the only way to get rid of it without agreeing to upgrade was to
close the window.

The difference is that now the upgrade is immediately scheduled without the
user's consent. If you close the window, following your past behavior, it
upgrades anyway. To stop the upgrade you need to click on an 8 point blue
link.

This didn't just start today. Everybody running windows 7 or 8 today has
REPEATEDLY declined Windows 10 upgrade notifications for months on-end. These
consumers made a choice not to upgrade, and Microsoft tricked them using
standard malware tactics!

That's why this is nothing less than a _shameful_ act by Microsoft.

~~~
mobiuscog
Nope.

In the past, you received notifications that you _could_ upgrade. You clicked
the Red X to _dismiss the notification_.

This time, you received a notification to tell you it was going to upgrade.
You clicked the Red X to _dismiss the notification_.

They're exactly the same process. The difference is that if you didn't
actually read the notification, you didn't know what it was telling you.

Anybody that really didn't want Windows 10 would have used one of the many
ways, either through group policy or 3rd party apps, to prevent even being
asked.

Sure, many people don't read dialogs or notifications, but that's not
Microsoft's fault - it's user's that can't be bothered to actually understand
what they're doing.

~~~
mistersquid
> Sure, many people don't read dialogs or notifications, but that's not
> Microsoft's fault - it's user's that can't be bothered to actually
> understand what they're doing.

Your response is either disingenuous or naive.

Changing how software behaves as established by previous UI conventions with
the differences restricted to changes in text labels is a known dark pattern.
Furthermore, it is well known that an increasing percentage of users will not
read to the end of a notification as they attempt to return to their initial
task. [0]

> As we all know, people tend to start reading at the beginning of a piece of
> text and as they advance, an increasing percentage of people give up and do
> not read to the end.

Unquestionably, the effect of dismissing the notice is different and, also
unquestionably, the people responsible for this behavioral change are well
aware of how such a change would affect users who have no intention of
upgrading.

What such a change achieves, in addition to tricking unwitting users into
upgrading, is plausible deniability.

[0] [http://alistapart.com/article/dark-patterns-deception-
vs.-ho...](http://alistapart.com/article/dark-patterns-deception-vs.-honesty-
in-ui-design\\)

EDIT: Supply missing object. Rhetorical emphasis in last sentence.

~~~
mobiuscog
Except _it 's not changing how software behaves_.

In both cases, clicking the Red X _dismisses_ the notification. That's it.
Nothing more. That's the UI convention as it always has been.

As for users not reading, that may well be the case - it doesn't mean it's not
their fault.

If you wanted to take aim at a screwy dialog, I'd go for the original [A]bort
[R]etry or [C]ancel... This 'change' (that isn't) is nothing compared to
around 75% of UIs today.

Sure, lots of people are upset because something didn't do what they expected.
Yup, the engineers sorting this out maybe aren't the greatest UI/UX people.

To state that MS are trying to 'trick' people is the disingenuous line though.

Anyway, I really can't be bothered to discuss it anymore, as (a) I read
dialogs, (b) I have machines that aren't auto upgrading because I followed the
methods to stop the prompts a while back, and (c) xkcd tells me it's time to
stop.

~~~
exodust
Regardless of people not reading dialog boxes, a major update of Windows can
take a long time and be very disruptive. When it's done, things may look and
feel unfamiliar and applications may not work.

Such a significant change should not come about automatically by way of simply
closing a dialog box.

There should at least be one final dialog box requiring confirmation: "go
ahead with Windows 10 update now? Yes/No" and if that dialog box has an X
close button, it should be wired up to "no".

If user clicks "yes", it would be polite to double check with "this update
could take awhile, are you sure?" and supply links to a checklist of things
people might want to know ahead of updating.

This is undoubtedly a deceptive and aggressive UI pattern by Microsoft for
their own product agenda, and the bad press is deserved.

------
pmx
Seeing them this desperate to get windows 10 on to people's computers for FREE
really has me worries about their motivations. I know it's loaded with
tracking and spy features, are they selling that collected data and want as
many people contributing to it as possible? Whether they want to or not? If I
could afford it I'd get a mac and be done with this nonsense. Used to use
ubuntu but I need photoshop :(

~~~
dspillett
A chunk of the telemetry recorded by Windows 10 has been back-ported to 7 and
8 in updates since anyway so that isn't a reason not to upgrade (though if it
is a concern to you it is a reason not to use 7 or 8 as much as it is a reason
not to use 10).

I have two machines that will likely never see Windows 10: a laptop on which
it ran like a one legged arthritic dog (8 wasn't terribly fast on there, 10
was just impossible, it currently runs Debian as a test-bed for a few things)
and a tablet that had significant driver issues that I don't particularly
expect to see resolved (so it'll be sticking at 8 as I don't have time to
upgrade and roll back again if it fails, my time is precious!).

The "but it is free" thing amuses me somewhat. Does anyone else remember
hearing the "Linux is only free if your time is worth nothing" mantra from
various Microsoft supporting camps?

~~~
Silhouette
_A chunk of the telemetry recorded by Windows 10 has been back-ported to 7 and
8 in updates since anyway so that isn 't a reason not to upgrade_

Of course it is a reason not to upgrade: in Windows 7 or 8.x _you don 't have
to install the telemetry_, but in Windows 10 you have no choice.

~~~
dspillett
Fair point, but you have to actively not install them if you have the
officially recommended configuration (automatic update, include recommended
updates).

Maybe I'm being overly cynical, but I can't believe the behaviour won't
"accidentally" get in without continued effort on the part of the user to
check that it isn't there. I for one don't have time not the care to keep
constantly monitoring the situation.

I accept that Windows is watching me, _whatever version_ , and if Windows
watching me becomes a problem in my mind I'll stop using Windows, _whatever
version_.

~~~
Silhouette
The thing is, my personal views are such that I wouldn't be happy using
Windows with unclear phone-home behaviour, but for my small businesses,
accepting that Windows is watching us in unknown ways is absolutely out of the
question for regulatory and contractual reasons.

The average home user might be set to automatically install recommended
updates, but I doubt many businesses or power users do that. The important
thing in this case is that they do have the option not to.

As for telemetry "accidentally" getting in, this is why as mentioned elsewhere
our policy is now not to install any Windows updates by default, even security
ones. We install _selected_ security updates manually, if and when we've
confirmed they are relevant to our needs and not getting reported for anything
sneaky.

Several of our machines can't even install those updates at the moment,
because Microsoft appear to have horribly broken Windows Update in the past
few weeks anyway, so until that's fixed it's a moot point anyway.

------
sandworm101
Does anyone have data on what percentage of devices fail the upgrade process?
Surely Mircosoft does. They also probably have data on how many people then
end up purchasing a new machine.

Microsoft seems to me like car dealer who in their spare time pours sugar into
the gas tanks of parked cars. They don't care how many people the
inconvenience. If even one percent of them buy a new car then it was worth the
sugar.

~~~
EdHominem
They could easily know, by counting the machines they told to upgrade and
counting the ones that came back from upgrade and subtracting one from the
other.

But you might be fired if you tried to implement the collection of that data.

------
0x0
I know several people who tried to be super diligent in opting out of windows
10 only to wake up to a win10 install on their PCs. They all ended up buying
Macbooks the next day.

Forced windows 10 upgrades seem to be the best advertisement OS X could ever
get.

~~~
exodust
Sounds fishy. I get that sneaky OS updating is unwanted, but it can be avoided
and there's an easy 3 click process to roll back if Windows 10 is installed.

Don't forget that Apple now enforce mandatory iOS updates, with no option to
opt out or disable the annoying reminders. Even if you have automatic system
updates turned off, the point release iOS updates are downloaded without your
permission in the background when the phone or iPad is charging. These updates
might be between 80 - 300 MB. The notification dialog boxes then begin their
attack, every day with two options "install now / remind me later".

This is actually worse than Windows, since on Windows we at least have the
option to disable the scheduled update and the reminder notifications. Not so
on iOS as of version 9.

------
cjensen
I got tired of being asked, so I used Never10 [1] which is freeware from a
reputable developer [2]. Never10 can also undo the decision and let you
upgrade if you change your mind.

[1] [https://www.grc.com/never10.htm](https://www.grc.com/never10.htm)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Gibson_(computer_program...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Gibson_\(computer_programmer\))

~~~
zapu
Also critique about [2]:

1)
[http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/7](http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/7)
regarding "raw socket panic"

2) [http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.org.user-
groups.linux.gnhlu...](http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.org.user-
groups.linux.gnhlug/22505) regarding questionable SpinRite application to fix
hard drive errors

~~~
cjensen
Yep, that's what the cite is for. Eccentric and sometimes "crazy uncle", but
has a reputation and isn't trying to murder your computer on purpose.

------
oarsinsync
Having done a fresh install of Win7 recently, I can confirm that only
installing important updates, not treating recommended updates the same, and
being highly selective of which optional updates (i.e. drivers only) prevents
any of the Windows 10 upgrade stuff from being installed.

This doesn't help anyone who has previously done things differently (which was
generally accepted as the best practice), but if you're setting up any new
hosts, the above may work out as well for you as it has for me.

~~~
degenerate
For those of you (or people you know) that still keep getting nagged about
Win10, this freeware works great at killing all the system tray, balloon, and
popup notifications:
[http://ultimateoutsider.com/downloads/](http://ultimateoutsider.com/downloads/)

------
LionessLover
I just re-activated that dialog (I had disabled it with registry setting
changes) because I don't want to miss the free upgrade option but use it at
the last moment.

Anyway - I found that when I simply say "No" to the inevitable "Terms and
conditions" license dialog question the upgrade stops even if you said "go
ahead" in the previous step.

~~~
ericolo
Wanted to comment precisely this. Yesterday my gf called me because she had
W10 on her laptop, installed, and about to start all the process of adding the
user and stuff (I think).

I clicked "I do no accept" to the license, got a warning that then they needed
to restore my previous version of windows, and 10 minutes later the laptop was
working as before.

Guess now I know why that happened.

~~~
0x0
Did the downgrade work perfectly? There's been a lot of reports of small
things not working anymore, like scheduled tasks -
[https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-
US/80e4f83d-1...](https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-
US/80e4f83d-1529-4405-b8e3-d1d636f8b71c/task-scheduler-is-broken-after-
windows-10-downgrade?forum=win10itprogeneral)

------
krapp

        The change occurred because the update is now labelled 
        "recommended" and many people have their PCs configured 
        to accept recommended updates for security reasons. 
    

Turn off automatic updating and never turn it back on, ever. At this point,
the biggest threat to Windows machines seems to be Microsoft themselves.

Manually update any Windows machines you run, unchecking the Windows 10
upgrade every single time. It will never stay unchecked, nor will it ever not
be recommended.

Until Microsoft decides to override _that_ and literally force it on everyone,
which I don't doubt they will do as soon as they feel they can afford the
class action lawsuits that will result from the few stragglers remaining,
there is no other way to avoid the upgrade, unless you actually want to hack
the registry or something.

~~~
JoshTriplett
> Turn off automatic updating and never turn it back on, ever. At this point,
> the biggest threat to Windows machines seems to be Microsoft themselves.

And if you turn off automatic updates, _you_ become the biggest threat to your
machine's security. (As well as to many other people on the Internet, when
your system becomes compromised and starts sending spam, DoS attacks, or other
botnet activities.)

Yes, some people don't like Windows 10. But Windows has moved to the
"evergreen" software model, as have many other pieces of software (including
browsers). If you don't like Windows 10, the answer isn't "run Windows 7
forever"; the answer is "stop running Windows, because you don't like where
it's going (or has already gone)".

~~~
Silhouette
_And if you turn off automatic updates, you become the biggest threat to your
machine 's security._

What is a bigger threat to your machine's security than not being able to use
it at all?

Our standard policy for a long time was not to auto-install any Windows
updates, and just to manually install security ones each month.

Our standard policy today is not to install any update, no matter what
Microsoft labels it with, unless we've identified a specific need for it. We
do a quick pass down the usual sources after patch day and install any
security updates that are potentially relevant _and_ haven't been causing
problems.

Given that Windows 7 is a relatively mature OS today and obviously we also
have a variety of other security measures in place, we consider the risk of
overlooking a minor security fix that actually matters to be much, much lower
than the risk of 2016's Microsoft breaking something by pushing an update we
didn't want.

 _If you don 't like Windows 10, the answer isn't "run Windows 7 forever"_

Yes. Yes, it is, at least for now. An operating system is just a tool you use
to get work done. Windows 7 works just fine on our hardware, and it runs the
software we need. If it ain't broke, don't let anyone break it, and spend your
time on actually useful things.

We're essentially betting that either Nadella and co will have got the boot
before Windows 7 support ends and a desperate Microsoft will have
significantly reversed course and offered a viable alternative by that time,
or someone else will have stepped up to offer serious business software on
another platform that we can migrate to by then.

~~~
Grishnakh
>Windows 7 works just fine on our hardware, and it runs the software we need.
If it ain't broke, don't let anyone break it, and spend your time on actually
useful things.

The problem is that it _is_ broken, in a way: it has security vulnerabilities,
just like any OS, and if it's connected to the internet has to be patched to
protect it. A deprecated OS is not going to get those security updates. Win7
won't be supported forever.

Of course, if your Win7 machine is not networked, then this doesn't apply to
you and you can run it forever, just like some industrial machines still run
MS-DOS.

>We're essentially betting that either Nadella and co will have got the boot
before Windows 7 support ends and a desperate Microsoft will have
significantly reversed course and offered a viable alternative by that time,
or someone else will have stepped up to offer serious business software on
another platform that we can migrate to by then.

Why would Nadella get the boot? Look at their stock price since he's taken
over: the company is doing great, much better than under Ballmer. All these
actions are good and correct: they make the company more money. Customers may
not like them, but too bad. Why should MS care about what its customers want?
It's not like they're going to abandon MS and Windows any time soon, so MS is
right to screw them over for more profit.

~~~
Silhouette
_A deprecated OS is not going to get those security updates. Win7 won 't be
supported forever._

But Windows 7 _isn 't_ deprecated. Microsoft have committed to supporting it
until 2020, and their customers will expect them to honour that commitment.

That is four years away. In a fast-paced industry like IT, the entire
landscape could be different by then.

 _Why would Nadella get the boot? Look at their stock price since he 's taken
over: the company is doing great, much better than under Ballmer._

You and I seem to be looking at very different stock charts. In the one I'm
looking at[1], MSFT had pretty respectable growth through 2013-2014 when they
were doing a lot of talking about Windows 10 and the new vision, but their
stock price looks much less happy since around the start of 2015 as the
reality became known.

In a few months, if Windows 10 is still far less established than Windows 7
and it becomes undeniable that the campaign to get everyone onto Windows 10
didn't succeed even with literally giving it away and underhand tricks like
the one we're talking about, executives like Nadella and Myerson are going to
be under a lot of pressure to present a more realistic vision of what happens
next and to turn the stock price back to a steady pattern of growth or their
positions are going to be under threat.

[1]
[https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=MSFT#symbol=MSFT](https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=MSFT#symbol=MSFT)

 _Why should MS care about what its customers want? It 's not like they're
going to abandon MS and Windows any time soon_

Perhaps not. I suspect they've probably got until about 14 January 2020 before
things get really bad.

But by that time, anything could have happened. Apple could have started
competing more aggressively for desktop/laptop/server markets. Less and less
business software could be locally hosted, making a range of different devices
that can access web apps more attractive. In more than three years, even a
major new player entering the market or a shift in strategy from some other
tech giant isn't out of the question.

Screwing your customers for profit looks good at the next quarterly earnings
call, but not so much two years or five years down the line when your
customers and competitors have had time to react.

~~~
Grishnakh
>But Windows 7 isn't deprecated. Microsoft have committed to supporting it
until 2020, and their customers will expect them to honour that commitment.

So what? They can change their mind at any time, and I for one hope they do.
What are customers going to do, file a complaint? hahaha

>You and I seem to be looking at very different stock charts.

I don't know what you're looking at, but the Google chart I'm looking at for
2010-now shows constant growth, starting at about 2012 and really gaining
steam in 2013, and continuing until now, albeit with some stumbling in the
first half of 2015. Their stock price now is higher than it ever was in
2013-2014, and is in general going up.

>Apple could have started competing more aggressively for
desktop/laptop/server markets. >...even a major new player entering the market
or a shift in strategy from some other tech giant isn't out of the question.

Apple's been competing in those markets for decades, and they're still a tiny
player. Linux beat them easily in servers. The idea of Apple servers is a
joke. And MS servers are locked into many places in enterprises thanks to
SharePoint, Exchange, AD, etc. and of course Windows on the desktop. Apple
hasn't gotten anywhere on the desktop for businesses, and not much in homes
either thanks to their high prices. I don't see that changing; Apple has
always had high prices. Linux has been tried on the desktop for decades too
(earnestly since around 1998), to little effect. And don't make me remind you
about the fate of BeOS.

>Screwing your customers for profit looks good at the next quarterly earnings
call, but not so much two years or five years down the line when your
customers and competitors have had time to react.

You seem to be making the classic mistake of thinking MS is a normal company
which has to worry about competition. It isn't. The only real threats they
have to their business are 1) their old OS versions (which they're dealing
with by pushing everyone to Win10 like it or not) and 2) the need for their
products being made obsolete by new technology (like tablets). #2 seemed to be
a concern for a while but it looks like the tablet market has gotten saturated
and that's played out. There's too much stuff you just can't do on a tablet,
so while some people can and have gone to all-mobile computing, everyone else
is stuck with Windows, and they aren't going to stop using it no matter what.
MS might as well take advantage of that as much as they can.

~~~
Silhouette
_They can change their mind at any time, and I for one hope they do._

Maybe the law is different where you are. In my country, the public statements
they have made about ongoing support would carry legal weight, and pulling
that support several years early would be obvious grounds for legal action.
Potentially they are on the hook for all kinds of nasty things, starting with
undermining every consumer purchase of a system with the version of Windows
that is no longer supported as promised.

 _I don 't know what you're looking at, but the Google chart I'm looking at
for 2010-now shows constant growth, starting at about 2012 and really gaining
steam in 2013, and continuing until now, albeit with some stumbling in the
first half of 2015. Their stock price now is higher than it ever was in
2013-2014, and is in general going up._

Well, you do know what chart I was looking at, because the link is right there
in my last post. Go ahead and follow it, and press the 5Y button.

On that chart, you'll see that after a couple of stagnant years around
2011-2012 that ultimately brought down Ballmer, you can draw a pretty straight
line through the stock price through 2013-2014, hitting close to 27, 37, and
then 47 at the start of 2013, 2014 and 2015. At close yesterday, nearly six
quarters dominated by Windows 10 news later, it stood at a touch over 50,
after the most volatile period of trading in years going below 40 and above 55
at times but always some way below the previous levels of growth.

You're correct that the stock price today _is_ higher than it ever was in
2013-2014. What you're glossing over is that it's a mere 1% or so higher than
it was at the peak of the 2013-2014 gains, nearly 17 months later. That's not
exactly impressive for a business with such a dominant history and supposedly
a whole new strategy to recover from the missteps of the previous few years.
About the only thing they have going for them lately is that they haven't
tanked along with the overall US markets since the start of this year.

 _Apple 's been competing in those markets for decades, and they're still a
tiny player._

Which markets? In laptops they seem to have about 10% market share. They're on
a comparable scale to any of the big Windows laptop manufacturers, something
like 5th or 6th by volume of sales IIRC, presumably higher by revenue since
they aim for the top end of the market. That's not nowehere on the desktop for
businesses.

The thing is, though, we're talking about 3-4 years out here before Windows 7
runs out of support. If Apple wanted to make a play for the middle part of the
market, maybe with a secondary brand, they easily have the financial
resources, infrastructure and technical chops to do it.

The other vaguely plausible alternative is that another huge tech firm decides
to actually give Linux clients a serious push. Obviously none of the current
distros is going to do that; the only one with anything like the resources to
make it happen is probably Red Hat, and their focus seems unlikely to shift
from the enterprise/server market. But if you look at Android and to some
extent Chrome OS and SteamOS, the potential for an unexpected sideways move to
some new type of device is always there.

In any case, if the current trend towards outsourced IT and cloud services
continues during that time frame, the advantages Microsoft retains in the
corporate server room will erode over time, and with them the barriers to
migrating to a completely different platform. Obviously it won't happen
overnight, but it doesn't have to.

------
arca_vorago
I'm going to share the best way I have found to kill any particular thing in
windows you don't like, including GWX: (this is not my full script, just a
section, so you will have to modify it)

taskkill /IM GWX*

takeown /r /d N /f c:\windows\system32\gwx

icacls c:\windows\system32\gwx\ _._ /c /t /deny everyone:F

icacls c:\windows\system32\gwx /c /t /deny everyone:F

reg add HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Gwx /v DisableGwx /t
REG_DWORD /d 1

edit: one thing I ran into that caused me to use this hackish script is that,
at least in the early GWX days, windows updates were re-enabling the GWX and
update registry keys. So a few tuesdays later and GWX is back and asking to
upgrade again.

~~~
sfont
This is my registry changes that has worked every time. Even when the install
is set to kick off with the next reboot.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate\OSUpgrade]
"ReservationsAllowed"=dword:00000000 "KickoffDownload"=dword:00000000
"KickoffSource"=dword:00000000 "AllowOSUpgrade"=dword:00000000
"Refresh"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate\OSUpgrade\State]
"OSUpgradeState"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate]
"DisableOSUpgrade"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Gwx]
"DisableGwx"=dword:00000001

~~~
tetraodonpuffer
interesting, I knew about the last two, but not the OSUpgrade ones, did you
find those are needed as well?

~~~
sfont
I copied the first part from a domain joined PC before a later update caused
them to receive the upgrade prompt as well. It's kind of belt and suspenders
so it doesn't harm but may not actually be needed.

------
5ilv3r
This bricked my sister in law's computer AND GUESS WHO GETS TO FIX IT.

Microsoft messed up. Instead of losing a windows 7 user and gaining a windows
10 user, they lost a windows 7 user and gained a boots-to-blackscreen user.

------
Fire-Dragon-DoL
My win7 configuration uses programdata and users folder on D. This is not
supportby windows 10, i tried the upgrade and everything broke, reverted
through cloned hdd. I have no plan in upgrading, my pc will die before and at
that point i'll format and reinstall (and never use users directory again),
they still push me that upgrade, it's terrible. People says "always update
your pc", but usually things get worse when you do

------
SeanDav
The underhanded and manipulative approach that Microsoft have taken with
Windows 10 has put me off Microsoft completely. It is important to trust your
OS and OS vendor and Microsoft have slipped up badly in this regard. Now they
expect me to give them full update control with Windows 10 - never going to
happen. Next OS is Linux.

------
snake_plissken
MS also continually re-enables the update if you block/hide it in Windows
Update. I've blocked it like 5 times in the past 5 months at my company's
workstation only to have it magically re-appear on a Monday morning. Just
leave me to my Windows 7 peace!

------
codeonfire
There needs to be a class action lawsuit. The people doing this at Microsoft
are not that familiar with western legal systems or basic sensibilities or
just don't care. A lawsuit will maybe wake them up.

~~~
zxcvcxz
It's probably more profitable for them to get more people on 10 and deal with
a law suit than to let people stay on the other versions.

~~~
Silhouette
Evidently the lawsuit needs a higher damages award. I thought the motivation
for having punitive damages in a legal system was so that courts could make
sure it was never cheaper to do the wrong thing and hope to ride out any
resulting legal action.

~~~
talmand
Doesn't matter, in the end all members of the class action lawsuit will
receive a coupon for a free copy of Windows 10 for their damages. The lawyers
will be paid in cash.

~~~
Silhouette
If the cash that pays the lawyers is a significant fraction of Microsoft's
annual revenues, that might still be considered a win.

------
CyberDildonics
My plan for my next computer is to not run windows on the bare metal but run
it in a VM as fast as possible. Does any know of a linux distribution that is
geared towards this? I basically want to boot to linux then choose various
virtual machine images to run.

~~~
emp_zealoth
Look into what supports PCI passthrough That tech looks amazing (I didn't have
the time to make it work though)

------
83457
Got hit by this yesterday on a computer I don't use frequently and a coworker
quickly turned machine off to prevent upgrade and all was well.

It is sad that they would stoop this low. I just don't understand it.

~~~
Grishnakh
>It is sad that they would stoop this low. I just don't understand it.

There's nothing "sad" about it. If this increases their corporate profits,
then it's the correct course of action. I'm only surprised they didn't resort
to tactics like this earlier; they were much too nice with their customers
before. They're doing a lot better now, by showing their customers who's boss.

What's sad is that customers actually think they deserve to be treated nicely.
I just don't understand that mentality. If you're willing to allow a vendor to
abuse you, over and over and over again, and you absolutely refuse to ditch
that vendor, then why shouldn't the vendor treat you poorly if they can make
more money doing so?

~~~
Silhouette
_They 're doing a lot better now, by showing their customers who's boss._

Microsoft might indeed be about to learn who's boss.

Spoiler: Absent legal or regulatory shenanigans, in the long run it's going to
be the people spending the money.

If you really believe Microsoft are strong enough to coerce most or all of
their entire market to move to Windows 10 when it's not in their interests, I
invite you to look up the current market share of Windows 7 vs. Windows 10,
and to consider that this is about 10 months into the 12 month free update
period already.

~~~
Grishnakh
>If you really believe Microsoft are strong enough to coerce most or all of
their entire market to move to Windows 10 when it's not in their interests, I
invite you to look up the current market share of Windows 7 vs. Windows 10,
and to consider that this is about 10 months into the 12 month free update
period already.

A huge number of people have upgraded to Win10. Many of those are because of
the underhanded tricks, but it doesn't matter; they've switched now. Now MS
just has to squeeze them some more by cutting support for Win7 early, or maybe
they could be like Apple and start pushing Win7 updates which massively slow
down the OS, in effect forcing people to upgrade.

What are people going to do, stop getting security updates? Or switch to a
different OS?

Face it, people and businesses are locked into Windows, and aren't going to
stop using it no matter what. MS can do whatever they want at this point; it's
not going to hurt them, and will only help them. The more people they can push
to Win10, the more money they'll make from advertising. I can't wait to see
them pushing mandatory advertising and spyware in Win10 Enterprise.

~~~
Silhouette
_Now MS just has to squeeze them some more by cutting support for Win7 early,_

That would surely result in lawsuits on such a scale that even Microsoft would
be lucky to survive the results.

 _or maybe they could be like Apple and start pushing Win7 updates which
massively slow down the OS, in effect forcing people to upgrade._

They already do seem to be crippling Windows 7 updates; there have been
numerous reports of problems since earlier this year where Windows Update will
sit there taking literally hours to do the most simple tasks, apparently
including several controlled experiments using new machines to prove that it
really is Windows Update at fault.

This doesn't bode well for anyone remaining on Windows 7, but of course it
bodes even less well for anyone committed to whatever update mechanism
Microsoft wants on Windows 10.

 _What are people going to do, stop getting security updates?_

Probably.

 _Or switch to a different OS?_

Possibly.

 _Face it, people and businesses are locked into Windows, and aren 't going to
stop using it no matter what._

There is rarely true lock-in within this industry. Usually there is only the
relative cost of migrating to new systems vs. staying put.

The thing is, migrating to a new OS is _already_ an extremely expensive, time-
consuming and risky proposition for large organisations. Entire teams of IT
staff spend months planning the switch, testing hardware and software on the
new platform, and so on. That is going to be true even if organisations decide
to upgrade to Windows 10 from whatever they're on already.

 _That_ is the inertia Microsoft really has to overcome if it wants to
establish Windows 10, and it's the same inertia that meant some organisations
were willing to pay millions for support beyond the official cut-off date with
Windows XP because that was still better for them than risking a migration
even to Windows 7, which had relatively few areas of risk in that scenario.

If they fail to do that, either by not making 10 an attractive proposition or
by trying to degrade 7 until people give up, then those big corporate
migration exercises do have alternatives they could consider, and sooner or
later some big names will actually make the jump. And if a few of them do that
and it becomes clear that they've done well out of it, that's very, very bad
for Microsoft. That's why I don't think they'll let it come to that.

~~~
Grishnakh
>That would surely result in lawsuits on such a scale that even Microsoft
would be lucky to survive the results.

Unless they're bound by a contract, which would only apply to very large
customers, they're under no obligation to continue support for Win7. It's just
like XP; there's no support for that unless you're a special customer who pays
extra for that support.

>They already do seem to be crippling Windows 7 updates; there have been
numerous reports of problems since earlier this year where Windows Update will
sit there taking literally hours to do the most simple tasks,

Yep, and there's no legal recourse here either. They can run Windows Updates
however they want. Don't like it? Don't get any updates, and leave yourself
open to hacking and malware.

>>What are people going to do, stop getting security updates? >Probably.

See above. Good luck dealing with the malware and hacking.

>>Or switch to a different OS? >Possibly.

You're joking, right? Linux backers have been trying to encourage people to
switch to that for ages and it hasn't gotten very far. Apple has a very strong
brand with huge success in mobile devices and they haven't gotten very far
either.

>There is rarely true lock-in within this industry.

WTF are you talking about? Every time anyone proposes switching to Linux, tons
of people pop up talking about all the applications they're bound to which
only work on Windows. Lock-in (with apps) is the entire reason Windows is so
dominant. It's the exact same reason that WinPhone has been a disaster and
can't make a dent in the Android and iPhone marketshare: there's no apps for
it.

>If they fail to do that, either by not making 10 an attractive proposition or
by trying to degrade 7 until people give up, then those big corporate
migration exercises do have alternatives they could consider

No, they don't. They're locked into tons of applications that only run on
Windows. As everyone knows, there's no Photoshop on Linux. The same is true
for countless business applications that most of us have never heard of, but
are critically important to businesses (and each business has different,
obscure applications it's bound to).

Don't forget, with larger businesses, they do site licenses, so they pay
constant license fees to MS no matter which MS they run. No matter what these
customers do, they're going to be paying MS for the privilege of running their
software. There's no way MS can screw this up, it's just a matter of which
tactic will maximize profit. At worst, they'll have a steady but constant
revenue stream.

~~~
Silhouette
_Unless they 're bound by a contract, which would only apply to very large
customers, they're under no obligation to continue support for Win7._

After giving clear public statements of their future support cycles? Good luck
being the lawyer defending that one in a nine-figure dollar lawsuit with a
Fortune 100 or ten.

 _Apple has a very strong brand with huge success in mobile devices and they
haven 't gotten very far either._

Now who's joking? Apple owns the high end of the laptop market and has for
years.

 _They 're locked into tons of applications that only run on Windows. As
everyone knows, there's no Photoshop on Linux._

No, there isn't. But people said the same thing about Adobe moving to Creative
Cloud a few years ago, and initially they dominated the market too, with a few
FOSS applications the not-really-competition. Today, though, there are several
very reasonable alternatives to CC applications in various parts of the
market, and they're gaining a foothold and loyal customer base very fast. Most
of them run on Macs rather than Windows, by the way.

~~~
Grishnakh
>After giving clear public statements of their future support cycles? Good
luck being the lawyer defending that one in a nine-figure dollar lawsuit with
a Fortune 100 or ten.

Yeah, so what happens when they pull support for Win7 Home and maybe Pro, and
continue it as normal for Enterprise, so that the Fortune 100 companies aren't
affected? Home users aren't going to sue MS, and SMBs aren't too likely to
either.

Don't forget, MS can claim they don't need to offer support to these smaller
users, because they're giving them a free "upgrade" to their latest and
greatest! You're right about the F100 companies, but they're a totally
different market. MS is still supporting XP for some companies remember;
they'd likely do the same (but maybe without any extra cost for a while) for
their enterprise customers running W7.

>Now who's joking? Apple owns the high end of the laptop market and has for
years.

Not in the corporate space they don't.

------
lgp171188
Imho, this looks like a deliberate ploy to get most Windows computers to
upgrade to Windows 10 so that they can force the App Store model in order to
get the 30% cut.

------
DrScump
And even _that_ assumes that Something doesn't Go Wrong:

[http://imgur.com/9WQcjyT](http://imgur.com/9WQcjyT)

------
ladzoppelin
Windows 10 needs to be forced just like OSX,Chrome and Ios. Deal with it or
use Ubuntu, which is actually very nice.

~~~
MrMullen
Neither OSX or IOS force upgrade. Chrome is an application, so that is a
Apples to Oranges comparison.

~~~
Silhouette
iOS upgrades are forced in all but name. Apple can and do remove versions of
apps that supporter older iOS versions from the App Store.

If you want the latest version of an app, you can be forced in practice to
update iOS as well, and with so many mobile apps depending on remote services,
something as simple as a change in the protocol for communicating with some
essential remote facility in an app can lead to an entire OS update.

The even crazier thing is that they also don't let you downgrade either the OS
or the apps if a new version is worse than what you had before.

------
zxcvcxz
Update broke my parents friends wifi and of course they call me and ask for
help, and of course they don't own an ethernet cable, and of course all he
does is use the web browser to look at porn.

~~~
Fuxy
If that is really the only thing they use I would just install Linux mint on
it in the long run it's probably better for them.

It's surprisingly easy to install mallware and viruses on a windows computer
cumputer these days see download.com for a good example.

Even I've done it a few times by accident luckily it was in a VM so I just
scrapped it.

There's basically no difference if all you do is browse the internet and if
they run into issued doing something and the only way to do it requires a
command line then revert it.

These days most basic things can be done very easily in linux without ever
touching the command line so the only barrier to entry is that computers don't
come pre-loaded with it.

~~~
emp_zealoth
>cumputer noun - a personal computer used just to browse porn!

------
CyberDildonics
One solution that seems to not get much attention is setting the windows
firewall to block outgoing connections by default. You then whitelist the
couple of programs that actually do need internet access (it isn't many,
mostly just web browsers).

Then you don't have to worry about windows or any other program pulling a bait
and switch on you.

~~~
CyberDildonics
More downvotes without any explanations. I've literally been doing this for
multiple years and it works great, I don't know why it ends up being such a
controversial solution.

~~~
exodust
Because "mostly just web browsers" isn't correct for a typical PC with decent
collection of good software. Many applications need outbound access and
whitelisting all of them would be painful. I would never attempt that on my PC
and agree with those who downvoted you!

Not only that, but sometimes it's not obvious which .exe file needs the
outbound access. Some programs use other modules to connect to remote servers
for application update checks and other things. Besides, you want Windows
security patches, so on many levels your idea tanks hard!

~~~
CyberDildonics
I have quite a bit of software on my computer and it really didn't turn out to
be necessary to whitelist very many of them. It really isn't a huge deal.
There are added benefits that something like visual studio tries to access the
internet for things that aren't really a benefit to someone who doesn't want
to give 'smiley face feedback' or log into their locally installed IDE for
some reason.

