6 ms·

I think this is why Valve and Gabe were so forceful in developing Steam OS. This is the end fo the road for all outside businesses like Valve and other elevato

by baldfat 10y ago

I think this is why Valve and Gabe were so forceful in developing Steam OS. This is the end fo the road for all outside businesses like Valve and other elevator systems. Microsoft has been doing so good community wise and I think this is the most evil thing they could have done. They are trying to be a walled garden. edit: deleted one word and spelling on one word

thatswrong0 10y ago
All of the (mild) interest I had in that new Windows laptop evaporated when I saw that's what came loaded on it by default. Sure, it's just a $50 upgrade on top a $1000+ machine to get a legitimate copy of Windows.. but something just irks the hell out of me that they think that this is a cool thing to do. Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't
- Arizhel 10y ago
  >Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't They've been acting evil like this for 40 years now; what makes you think they're ever going to change?
  - erikpukinskis 10y ago
    I remember the old times, and am quick to remind of what they did to Netscape, Samba, et al. But to answer your question... New blood, and fear. Gates is gone, and Ballmer was humiliated by the iPhone. Management now has to be in constant fear of ceding more ground in the consumer space. And they know that as consumer goes, so goes business... 20 years later. Many of Microsoft's recent moves are heartening. Supporting Mono officially. Implementing web standards quickly. Backing off this signed app stuff in Win10. MS has never had as much commercial pressure as they have now. They can't afford to alienate their niche supporters they way they could when they were the de facto everything. That gave me hope. Of course old habits die hard, but I don't think it's impossible for a company to evolve. IBM did. Apple did.
    - vezycash 10y ago
      You're right about fear. People who don't admit their fear, do something to mask the fear. MS is masking their fear of being ridiculed for ugliness by focusing unduly on design. The result has been "form over function." And now, MS pays lip service to productivity. They also focus intently on security to avoid being ridiculed for unsecure software (viruses, bugs, crashes compared to Mac and linux). The result? Closed Windows Phone and Windows Apps which unfortunately doomed both; and forced updates with intrusive data collection. Last but most important, MS's is as fast as a tortoise compared to Google, Apple, Amazon... They can't seem to make up their minds on features, app and OS design - hence the multiple reboots of Music turned Groove; Universal apps/Metro apps/UWP; Wp7,8,8.1,10->?, skype/message app, Metro skype and now UWP skype. For a company which built itself on compatibility, the constant change in direction is death by a thousand cuts.
- JayHost 10y ago
  "Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't" Stockholm Syndrome. "...something just irks the hell out of me that they think that this is a cool thing to do." Yeah, restricted freedom and anti-democratic business practices irks a whole lot of us. :)
  - shrimp_emoji 10y ago
    But, when Apple does it, people like it, don't they? Microsoft's just been trying to be Apple ever since the Zune.
    - brianwawok 10y ago
      I just dumped my last Windows pc. All ubuntu. There are finally some good ubuntu laptops. Put your money where your values are.
      - ximeng 10y ago
        I have one Ubuntu one Windows at home, Windows made me update again today (last time a week or two ago) - took forty minutes. Next PC will have Ubuntu on it too.
        vezycash 10y ago
        Turn off the update service. And there's three settings to make sure it doesn't reactivate itself. I held of updates for two years. Long story short: you can still decide when you want to update Windows - 10 steps instead of one.
        walterbell 10y ago
        Does that work on all versions of Windows 10?
        vezycash 10y ago
belltaco 10y ago
It is exactly like ChromeOS, and focused on education as well and probably won't sell as much as them anyway. >Recent numbers from consulting firm Futuresource paint a similar picture, with Google commanding 58 percent of U.S. K-12 schools. Windows is in second with around 22 percent and the combined impact of MacOS and iOS are close behind at 19 percent. It’s a rapidly shifting landscape. Three years earlier, Apple’s products represented nearly half of devices being shipped to U.S. classrooms Can students install anything like Steam on Chromebooks or iPads without jailbreaking them? It feels like once people see 'Microsoft' in the headline they lose all sense of perspective and automatically scream murder but Google and Apple get a complete free pass to do whatever lockdown they want.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- embik 10y ago
  > Can students install anything like Steam on Chromebooks without jailbreaking them? Turning on "developer mode" isn't exactly jailbreaking, so yes, they have access to the underlying Linux and can even run a Linux desktop environment of their choice on top of ChromeOS. They can't install Steam because that only supports x86 but you can't blame ChromeOS for that. I'm pretty sure you won't be able to do that with Windows S, so, no, it's not exactly like ChromeOS. edit: See http://www.dudleymediagroup.com/Detail/id/how-to-game-with-steam-on-a-google-chromebook-2335 http://www.dudleymediagroup.com/Detail/id/how-to-game-with-s...
  - mbilker 10y ago
    Many Chromebooks are x86-based, but probably not the cheaper ARM ones.
    - embik 10y ago
      You're absolutely right, somehow I connected Chromebooks to "always ARM". My bad.
  - scholia 10y ago
walterbell 10y ago
If Microsoft starts a me-too race to the bottom of a walled well of surveillance capitalism, they will squander their PC heritage and create a new market for commercially open operating systems. It may take a decade or more, but if Microsoft sidelines Win32, the market will find an alternative. Hundreds of millions of Windows users will not be ignored and will not surrender commercial freedoms that Microsoft itself has proven technically possible.
ksk 10y ago
>They are trying to be a walled garden. How is that any different from Steam? Every major company today wants to be a walled garden controlled by proprietary systems. Its either that, or they wan't to be a subscription service or a toll booth. Its unfortunate, but simply selling software is going away..
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  Your hardware isn't locked to Steam by default. You can install GOG or whatever for free.
  - ksk 10y ago
    Steam is not an OS though. Is it a feature of Steam OS to allow multiple stores to be installed?
- baldfat 10y ago
  Walled Garden = How do you like the different browsers in Aoole's app store? Steam isn't a walled garden, because you don't have to use Steam. You can use gog.com or humblebundle.com or gamersgate.com. Heck you can buy a game on Steam and gog.com will have the game for you on galaxy. You can buy humble bundles and get steam keys. Steam is a store and you can buy the same exact products and use them on your computer. Windows 10 S you have one store and can only buy it from one place.
  - ksk 10y ago
    >Walled Garden = How do you like the different browsers in Aoole's app store? That's as arbitrary a definition as any. Walled garden = A hyper-controlled environment where you have zero control over access to content and services. If steam is "just a store" why do I need steam installed _AT ALL_ after I purchase the game? Why can't I just run the binary? After all, I paid for it. Next, Valve can ban my entire steam account at any point in time for any reason, without any recourse, and kick me outside the 'garden' and locking me out of every single game that I purchased. They have complete control over who gets to play in their garden and how they play. Now, I happen to like _SOME_ of the things Valve does, but I don't kid myself into thinking its something it isn't. >Windows 10 S you have one store and can only buy it from one place. Steam is an application, not an OS. Now I wonder if Valve will allow Microsoft to have a store on Steam OS. That would be an apples-to-apples comparison.

by baldfat 10y ago

thatswrong0 10y ago

All of the (mild) interest I had in that new Windows laptop evaporated when I saw that's what came loaded on it by default. Sure, it's just a $50 upgrade on top a $1000+ machine to get a legitimate copy of Windows.. but something just irks the hell out of me that they think that this is a cool thing to do. Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't

Arizhel 10y ago
>Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't They've been acting evil like this for 40 years now; what makes you think they're ever going to change?
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  I remember the old times, and am quick to remind of what they did to Netscape, Samba, et al. But to answer your question... New blood, and fear. Gates is gone, and Ballmer was humiliated by the iPhone. Management now has to be in constant fear of ceding more ground in the consumer space. And they know that as consumer goes, so goes business... 20 years later. Many of Microsoft's recent moves are heartening. Supporting Mono officially. Implementing web standards quickly. Backing off this signed app stuff in Win10. MS has never had as much commercial pressure as they have now. They can't afford to alienate their niche supporters they way they could when they were the de facto everything. That gave me hope. Of course old habits die hard, but I don't think it's impossible for a company to evolve. IBM did. Apple did.
  - vezycash 10y ago
    You're right about fear. People who don't admit their fear, do something to mask the fear. MS is masking their fear of being ridiculed for ugliness by focusing unduly on design. The result has been "form over function." And now, MS pays lip service to productivity. They also focus intently on security to avoid being ridiculed for unsecure software (viruses, bugs, crashes compared to Mac and linux). The result? Closed Windows Phone and Windows Apps which unfortunately doomed both; and forced updates with intrusive data collection. Last but most important, MS's is as fast as a tortoise compared to Google, Apple, Amazon... They can't seem to make up their minds on features, app and OS design - hence the multiple reboots of Music turned Groove; Universal apps/Metro apps/UWP; Wp7,8,8.1,10->?, skype/message app, Metro skype and now UWP skype. For a company which built itself on compatibility, the constant change in direction is death by a thousand cuts.
JayHost 10y ago
"Each time I think they've changed, they make it clear that they haven't" Stockholm Syndrome. "...something just irks the hell out of me that they think that this is a cool thing to do." Yeah, restricted freedom and anti-democratic business practices irks a whole lot of us. :)
- shrimp_emoji 10y ago
  But, when Apple does it, people like it, don't they? Microsoft's just been trying to be Apple ever since the Zune.
  - brianwawok 10y ago
    I just dumped my last Windows pc. All ubuntu. There are finally some good ubuntu laptops. Put your money where your values are.
    - ximeng 10y ago
      I have one Ubuntu one Windows at home, Windows made me update again today (last time a week or two ago) - took forty minutes. Next PC will have Ubuntu on it too.
      - vezycash 10y ago
        Turn off the update service. And there's three settings to make sure it doesn't reactivate itself. I held of updates for two years. Long story short: you can still decide when you want to update Windows - 10 steps instead of one.
        walterbell 10y ago
        Does that work on all versions of Windows 10?
        vezycash 10y ago

belltaco 10y ago

It is exactly like ChromeOS, and focused on education as well and probably won't sell as much as them anyway. >Recent numbers from consulting firm Futuresource paint a similar picture, with Google commanding 58 percent of U.S. K-12 schools. Windows is in second with around 22 percent and the combined impact of MacOS and iOS are close behind at 19 percent. It’s a rapidly shifting landscape. Three years earlier, Apple’s products represented nearly half of devices being shipped to U.S. classrooms Can students install anything like Steam on Chromebooks or iPads without jailbreaking them? It feels like once people see 'Microsoft' in the headline they lose all sense of perspective and automatically scream murder but Google and Apple get a complete free pass to do whatever lockdown they want.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
embik 10y ago
> Can students install anything like Steam on Chromebooks without jailbreaking them? Turning on "developer mode" isn't exactly jailbreaking, so yes, they have access to the underlying Linux and can even run a Linux desktop environment of their choice on top of ChromeOS. They can't install Steam because that only supports x86 but you can't blame ChromeOS for that. I'm pretty sure you won't be able to do that with Windows S, so, no, it's not exactly like ChromeOS. edit: See http://www.dudleymediagroup.com/Detail/id/how-to-game-with-steam-on-a-google-chromebook-2335 http://www.dudleymediagroup.com/Detail/id/how-to-game-with-s...
- mbilker 10y ago
  Many Chromebooks are x86-based, but probably not the cheaper ARM ones.
  - embik 10y ago
    You're absolutely right, somehow I connected Chromebooks to "always ARM". My bad.
- scholia 10y ago

walterbell 10y ago

If Microsoft starts a me-too race to the bottom of a walled well of surveillance capitalism, they will squander their PC heritage and create a new market for commercially open operating systems. It may take a decade or more, but if Microsoft sidelines Win32, the market will find an alternative. Hundreds of millions of Windows users will not be ignored and will not surrender commercial freedoms that Microsoft itself has proven technically possible.

ksk 10y ago

>They are trying to be a walled garden. How is that any different from Steam? Every major company today wants to be a walled garden controlled by proprietary systems. Its either that, or they wan't to be a subscription service or a toll booth. Its unfortunate, but simply selling software is going away..

erikpukinskis 10y ago
Your hardware isn't locked to Steam by default. You can install GOG or whatever for free.
- ksk 10y ago
  Steam is not an OS though. Is it a feature of Steam OS to allow multiple stores to be installed?
baldfat 10y ago
Walled Garden = How do you like the different browsers in Aoole's app store? Steam isn't a walled garden, because you don't have to use Steam. You can use gog.com or humblebundle.com or gamersgate.com. Heck you can buy a game on Steam and gog.com will have the game for you on galaxy. You can buy humble bundles and get steam keys. Steam is a store and you can buy the same exact products and use them on your computer. Windows 10 S you have one store and can only buy it from one place.
- ksk 10y ago
  >Walled Garden = How do you like the different browsers in Aoole's app store? That's as arbitrary a definition as any. Walled garden = A hyper-controlled environment where you have zero control over access to content and services. If steam is "just a store" why do I need steam installed _AT ALL_ after I purchase the game? Why can't I just run the binary? After all, I paid for it. Next, Valve can ban my entire steam account at any point in time for any reason, without any recourse, and kick me outside the 'garden' and locking me out of every single game that I purchased. They have complete control over who gets to play in their garden and how they play. Now, I happen to like _SOME_ of the things Valve does, but I don't kid myself into thinking its something it isn't. >Windows 10 S you have one store and can only buy it from one place. Steam is an application, not an OS. Now I wonder if Valve will allow Microsoft to have a store on Steam OS. That would be an apples-to-apples comparison.