4 ms·

I don’t have a dog in the fight, I don’t choose Gmail or Outlook. But if I were to play devil’s advocate, I think I would argue Outlook is better on the grounds

by 40four 6y ago

I don’t have a dog in the fight, I don’t choose Gmail or Outlook. But if I were to play devil’s advocate, I think I would argue Outlook is better on the grounds that Microsoft is not an advertising company. As a company, they don’t depend on distributing free software to folks who are willing to, or maybe ignorant they are trading their personal privacy in exchange. No doubt Microsoft is trying to monetize user data at this point as well, but their empire isn’t built on top of it. The parent comment said they use ProtonMail for personal, So I suspect they only reason they don’t choose that for business also is the weight the Microsoft name still holds. Many of us got sucked into the Google vortex a while back on the basis they gave us many of the best software options, in many categories. But at this point, there is nothing Google does that you can’t find an alternative of equal or better quality. So if one day a person realizes Google values don’t align with their own, slowly phasing out all Google services can only have a net positive.

dilyevsky 6y ago
Microsoft business model is trying to insert themselves as a middleman between you and device in as many ways as possible and collect toll fees. I’m not a philosopher but not sure that’s ethically superior to showing ads (also they do show you ads)
- 40four 6y ago
  I don’t disagree, I think you’re right. I can just identify with folks trying to slowly de-google their lives, I’ve been on a similar mission around a year. The Microsoft name does still carry a lot of weight in the business world, so I suspect that’s the only reason the parent is still partially using them. If it were me I’d go ahead and go full protonmail (or others), but I get the reluctance.
- smt88 6y ago
  > trying to insert themselves as a middleman between you and device in as many ways as possible and collect toll fees So... they're a software company? Specifically an OS vendor? Seriously, how does your description imply anything unethical? You can't even buy a device today that forces you to use MS. You can always install something else or hack your Windows installation however you want.
  - dilyevsky 6y ago
    Unethical part is having oems ship all their devices with proprietary apis and software that is black box. > You can't even buy a device today that forces you to use MS That’s only because they lost that battle.
    - smt88 6y ago
      > Unethical part is having oems ship all their devices with proprietary apis and software that is black box. This is nonsense. Microsoft doesn't ship most hardware running Windows, and there was never a time any of it was locked to Windows. I installed Linux on dozens of Windows machines starting in the 90s. By your logic, all software is unethical if it's closed-source. Apple, Samsung, and every phone manufacturer actually do put effort into locking down their hardware, so you must think they're all far more evil than MS.
kingbirdy 6y ago
Microsoft is approaching that strategy with Windows - they're very nearly giving away Windows 10 at this point, and it ships a lot of data back to MS, plus you're essentially the beta tester for software updates for their enterprise customers.
basch 6y ago
>I think I would argue Outlook is better on the grounds that Microsoft is not an advertising company. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesnt the free outlook.com (formerly hotmail) still have ads for everybody who doesnt pay? When I log in, I have a banner on the right. But to your point, maybe the ad is there to annoy people into paying, and less as a source of revenue.

by 40four 6y ago

dilyevsky 6y ago

Microsoft business model is trying to insert themselves as a middleman between you and device in as many ways as possible and collect toll fees. I’m not a philosopher but not sure that’s ethically superior to showing ads (also they do show you ads)

40four 6y ago
I don’t disagree, I think you’re right. I can just identify with folks trying to slowly de-google their lives, I’ve been on a similar mission around a year. The Microsoft name does still carry a lot of weight in the business world, so I suspect that’s the only reason the parent is still partially using them. If it were me I’d go ahead and go full protonmail (or others), but I get the reluctance.
smt88 6y ago
> trying to insert themselves as a middleman between you and device in as many ways as possible and collect toll fees So... they're a software company? Specifically an OS vendor? Seriously, how does your description imply anything unethical? You can't even buy a device today that forces you to use MS. You can always install something else or hack your Windows installation however you want.
- dilyevsky 6y ago
  Unethical part is having oems ship all their devices with proprietary apis and software that is black box. > You can't even buy a device today that forces you to use MS That’s only because they lost that battle.
  - smt88 6y ago
    > Unethical part is having oems ship all their devices with proprietary apis and software that is black box. This is nonsense. Microsoft doesn't ship most hardware running Windows, and there was never a time any of it was locked to Windows. I installed Linux on dozens of Windows machines starting in the 90s. By your logic, all software is unethical if it's closed-source. Apple, Samsung, and every phone manufacturer actually do put effort into locking down their hardware, so you must think they're all far more evil than MS.

kingbirdy 6y ago

Microsoft is approaching that strategy with Windows - they're very nearly giving away Windows 10 at this point, and it ships a lot of data back to MS, plus you're essentially the beta tester for software updates for their enterprise customers.

basch 6y ago

>I think I would argue Outlook is better on the grounds that Microsoft is not an advertising company. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesnt the free outlook.com (formerly hotmail) still have ads for everybody who doesnt pay? When I log in, I have a banner on the right. But to your point, maybe the ad is there to annoy people into paying, and less as a source of revenue.