4 ms·

Those memos are over 20 years old. You can't point to something 20 years old and say "see, they did it before therefore that's what's happening today". I'm not

Those memos are over 20 years old. You can't point to something 20 years old and say "see, they did it before therefore that's what's happening today". I'm not a fan of what they're doing with some of the Windows 10 defaults. But you gotta be crazy to not see the user improvements they've done in so many other areas. They are a very, very different company than they were back then. I'm not saying that excuses anything but you're drawing false equivalences using a 2 decades old set of memos to try and back it.

duncan_bayne 9y ago
The underlying theme is _exactly_ the same: they will chuck their users under the bus for what they see as important strategic goals. It was true 20 years ago, and everything I can see suggests it's still true today. This is part of the reason I gave up developing for Windows and .NET after around a decade of doing it. I prefer to work on a stack with which I'm at least partially values-aligned. (Same reason I abandoned Linux for FreeBSD, actually).
Karunamon 9y ago
In the same way, you also can't say "That's 20 years old and not relevant anymore". Appeal to novelty fallacy and all that. Are they really that different of a company? Microsoft is huge, organizational memory is long, and decisions made long ago, whether rational or mere cargo culting, will affect how they run today. I'd argue they're a bit more cunning, but not one whit less underhanded. The EU browser ballot thing was considerably more recent, for instance. The forced W10 upgrades with the trick X dialog. Dark patterns surrounding use of a Microsoft account. Non-disableable telemetry. Hawking Edge in a way that would even make Chrome blush [1]. I think they know that they can't be as overt anymore; a couple of antitrust suits will do that to you. [1]: https://i.imgur.com/W56CuN6.jpg https://i.imgur.com/W56CuN6.jpg
OnlyRepliesToBS 9y ago
"They're different" without any evidence. False equivalence? Microsoft IS a convicted monopolist. That DID happen.

duncan_bayne 9y ago

The underlying theme is _exactly_ the same: they will chuck their users under the bus for what they see as important strategic goals. It was true 20 years ago, and everything I can see suggests it's still true today. This is part of the reason I gave up developing for Windows and .NET after around a decade of doing it. I prefer to work on a stack with which I'm at least partially values-aligned. (Same reason I abandoned Linux for FreeBSD, actually).

Karunamon 9y ago

In the same way, you also can't say "That's 20 years old and not relevant anymore". Appeal to novelty fallacy and all that. Are they really that different of a company? Microsoft is huge, organizational memory is long, and decisions made long ago, whether rational or mere cargo culting, will affect how they run today. I'd argue they're a bit more cunning, but not one whit less underhanded. The EU browser ballot thing was considerably more recent, for instance. The forced W10 upgrades with the trick X dialog. Dark patterns surrounding use of a Microsoft account. Non-disableable telemetry. Hawking Edge in a way that would even make Chrome blush [1]. I think they know that they can't be as overt anymore; a couple of antitrust suits will do that to you. [1]: https://i.imgur.com/W56CuN6.jpg https://i.imgur.com/W56CuN6.jpg

OnlyRepliesToBS 9y ago

"They're different" without any evidence. False equivalence? Microsoft IS a convicted monopolist. That DID happen.